Precious Like Rubies
by Soledad
Summary: Sherlock is dead and John needs a change of scenery. Will he get more than he bargained for?
1. Chapter 1: A Change of Scenery

**Precious Like Rubies**

**by Soledad**

**Fandom:** Miss Marple/Sherlock BBC crossover

**Genre:** Drama/Family

**Rating:** Teens, for now

**Disclaimer:** "Sherlock" and all related characters belong to Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. The modern versions of them belong to the BBC, Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, may their muses never abandon them. Miss Marple belongs to Dame Agatha Christie. The "Animal Ark" characters belong to their respective authors. I only borrow settings and characters to have some fun. No copyright infringement intended and no money made.

**Summary:** Sherlock is dead and John needs a change of scenery. Will he get more than he bargained for?

**Note:** The very idea of this story is based on the fact that St Mary Mead's resident GP, Dr. Haydock, used to have a partner named Dr Sandford. That _almost_ sounds like Stamford who, of course, is a key "Sherlock" character, bringing John and Sherlock together in the first place. I thought I'd let Mike meddle a bit again and see what happens. To that end, I had to screw a bit with the Miss Marple timeline, planting the old lady in the Sherlock era. In everything else, I was following both canons as far as possible for this story to still work.

Beta read by Linda Hoyland whom I owe my never-ending gratitude.

* * *

**Chapter 01 – A Change of Scenery**

After Sherlock's funeral John went on like an automaton for nearly a year.

He moved out of 221B, to a bleak little flat he could afford on his small Army pension and with the help of what his locum job paid. Actually, it did pay somewhat better now that he did show up more regularly instead of excusing himself half the time because of Sherlock's constant demands of his time.

There was no longer any danger of that.

Fortunately for him, Sarah had been most understanding and called him in every time a replacement doctor was needed.

Unfortunately for him, she was clearly doing this because she felt sorry for him. For the hell police and press had dragged him through. For the loss of Sherlock. For his bleak life without hope. And if there was _anything_ John hated like the plague, it was people pitying him. For whatever reason.

Still, when alone with himself – an increasingly frequent occasion lately – he had to admit that he _was_ miserable. The job was dull and paid very little. His new flat was small, impersonal and almost empty. The sessions with Ella were even more useless than before, so he cancelled them.

He moved around as if separated by every other person in the world by a bubble of vacuum. A vacuum caused by the total lack of _Sherlock_ in his life.

He couldn't stay at Baker Street, he simply couldn't. Not for the lack of financial means; Sherlock had left all his founds to him by way of a valid last will, so he could freely dispose of the money, Mycroft explained.

He got his nose broken for his pains.

He didn't press charges, though. Moreover, he saw to it that John wouldn't be charged for breaking the Chief Superintendent's nose, either. Instead, he had the Chief Superintendent removed from his position for _not_ being impartial in Sherlock's case. Oh, the nominal reason was a different one, but everybody saw through that, down to the lowliest beat cop.

Mycroft also pulled some strings so that Lestrade would be able to keep his job and could hope to be fully reinstated as soon as the internal investigation of every single case in which Sherlock had been involved was finished.

He didn't think Mycroft for his intervention. Neither did John. Both refused to talk to Mycroft ever again.

Only that John refused to talk to Lestrade, either. Or to anyone else from the police. Or to Harry, for that matter. Or even to update his blog after the day Sherlock had jumped.

He still met Mrs Hudson from time to time. They went to small restaurants and cheap cafés in which Sherlock had never set foot. They visited Sherlock's grave. But John never returned to Baker Street. He couldn't bear the emptiness of it; without Sherlock's boundless energy, without the screeching of the violin at 3 p.m, without the (barely) controlled explosions in the kitchen, the flat was empty and silent like a grave.

Mrs Hudson, bless her dear old soul, understood that. She spent a lot of time at her sister's lately, too, avoiding the deafening emptiness of the house as much as she could. She didn't want to take in other tenants, though, and Mycroft humoured her by paying the rent for 221B, instead of putting Sherlock's things in storage.

Mrs Hudson was the only one who had thanked him for his efforts since Sherlock's death.

John thought it was a horrible idea, turning the flat in some sort of museum, or shrine, for Sherlock, instead of moving on. It the war had taught him anything at all, it was to leave the dead to their rest and go on with his life, such as it was, even if it broke his heart.

Because in this case, it did. Which was why he never set foot in 221B again. Mike had been kind enough to collect his belongings and help him move into his new place.

It was somehow disheartening that all his stuff wasn't enough to fill up a flat of the size of a shoebox. But at least it was all his. The beginning of his new, bleak life.

A life without Sherlock Holmes in it.

* * *

"I think I need a change of scenery," he told Mike on one of their regular meetings at their favourite pub. "I'll never get better if I stay in London. Every stone here reminds me of Sherlock – and what happened. Even my job reminds me… hell, even _Sarah_ reminds me of him!"

"That can't be healthy," Mike agreed. "What do you have in mind?"

""I'm not sure," John admitted. "If I could I'd move out of London entirely. To somewhere where people never heard of Sherlock, if such a thing is possible. Start a whole new life."

"Under a fake name?" Mike grinned. "You could always call yourself Dr. Hamish, you know. It has a distinctive sound."

John shook his head. "Nah, not necessary. Watson is a common enough name. There were four of us in our graduate group at university; and one of the others was a John, too. And I have a common enough face. A change of haircut and nobody will recognise me."

"Save for those who know you well," Mike pointed out.

"Well, yes, those are the ones I'd like to avoid at any price," John replied, before realising what he'd just said and adding apologetically. "Present company excluded, of course."

Mike waved generously with a fleshy hand. "Never mind. If you wanted to avoid _me_, we wouldn't be sitting here twice a week."

"And you wouldn't be chewed out for it by your wife twice a week," John finished for him, smiling.

Mike's wife didn't like her husband spending so much time with a grieving friend any better than John's short-lived girlfriends used to like sharing him with Sherlock. She was a somewhat scatter-brained Welshwoman from Swansea, born to well-to-do parents who doted on her just a bit too much – with the unfortunate result that she now expected the same treatment from her husband and took offence on the fact that Mike wasn't willing to drop his friends on her every whim.

Sherlock gave them – _had given them_, John corrected himself bitterly – three months when they had married last year. Those three months were nearly over, but Mike still didn't show any willingness to leave her. He was a good-natured and patient man; and, John supposed, Gwen's high-strung attitude was good for him in a way. It kept him on his toes, and he needed that.

"In any case," Mike continued, "if you're serious about moving out of London, I might know just the place for you."

John gave him a surprised look. "You do?"

"I do," Mike smiled contentedly. "You can't know this, of course, we've drifted apart after training, but I used to work in a small village practice for a few weeks every day before getting this teaching job at _Bart's_. I couldn't really afford a holiday back then, so whenever the local GP went on his, I'd go to this little village, out of London, peace, quiet, fresh air… all that stuff. I got fed by his housekeeper – an old dragon, mind you, but she was an amazing cook – treated the little old ladies and had a grand time all in all. It's a nice place; I think you'd like it."

"But I need more than just a few weeks of work," John reminded him.

Mike nodded. "I know. That's why I'm mentioning it. Dr. Haydock called me a couple of days ago. He's quite old now and intends to retire – at least partially. He's looking for a partner; for someone to share the practice with. Someone who'd do the house calls and all that stuff he isn't fit enough for anymore."

"And you think I could do that?" John asked doubtfully. "You know I don't even have a car."

"You can use his," Mike shrugged. "You still _can_ drive, can't you?"

"Haven't done since Afghanistan; and military jeeps are a different matter anyway," John replied. "Tell me more about this place. Where is it?"

"Only twenty-five miles from London, but it seems like in another world," Mike explained. "Or rather another time. Most of the village hasn't changed much since the 1950s, save for that ugly housing estate they call _The Development_. Most of the old houses are Victorian structures, like Gossington Hall or the Vicarage itself, but there are a few very lovely Queen Anne and Georgian houses on the Old Pasture Lane. "

"Seriously, Mike, I'd never be able to afford this place," John laughed a little bitterly, because all that sounded very tempting to him.

"Of course you will," Mike said. "You see, the village has been stagnating for quite some time. More than a few cottages are standing empty cause their owners died and the younger generation moved away to the nearby towns… or to London itself. I'm sure you'll find something that you can afford – there's a lot to choose from."

"It sounds very nice," John admitted. "I really need to get out of here. To someplace where I can be just myself, plain old John Watson; not the blogger of the fake genius."

"Hey!" Mike said sternly. "Sherlock wasn't a fake, and we both know it. And sooner or later the rest of the world will realise it, too."

"Yeah, that won't make him alive again," John replied.

"No," Mike agreed. "But you said yourself that you need to move on. I can call Dr. Haydock for you, and if I recommend you, he'll listen. The question is: do you want the job?"

"I'm not sure," John said. "I think I ought to see the place first. What's it called anyway?"

"It's called St. Mary Mead," Mike answered. "You can reach it by train from Paddington Station."

* * *

In his comfortable little cottage beyond the grand Victorian structure of the Vicarage, St Mary Mead's local GP, Dr Gerard Haydock, saw off the last patient of the day and then simply collapsed in his favourite armchair. He was grateful to the old ladies of the village who mistrusted 'that new hospital' in Much Benham, coming to him instead and keeping his little practice in business, but sometimes they could be a bit too much, even for his well-trained patience.

Especially his next door neighbour, Mrs Price-Ridley, a rich and imperious widow who was the most vicious gossip of all the old ladies of the village. And that, considering that the venerable circle consisted of people like Miss Hartnell and Miss Wetherby, was saying a lot.

Haydock shook his head and chuckled fondly. The unholy trinity of the Old Pasture Lane – long-nosed, gushing and excitable Miss Wetherby, proud and decent Miss Hartnell with her deep, almost baritone voice, and, of course, the infamous Miss Marple of Danemead Cottage – seemed to grow more curious and inquisitive with each passing year.

They were in their early eighties, all three of them, which came with restrictions where physical activities were concerned. They could no longer work in their gardens all afternoon. They could no longer visit families in need (to the great relief of such families, as they used to dread the visits of the resolute Miss Hartnell). Not even knitting would go as smoothly as before, Miss Marple had complained recently, due to the slow failing of their eyesight. But they still could do what they'd always done best: watching the passers-by from their window and gossiping about their neighbours.

The thought that they had so much more time to do so was, frankly, a little alarming.

Dr Haydock sighed and get on his feet to close the practice for the day. He was only marginally younger than the aforementioned three ladies, and whiles till fit and agile for his age, the thought of retiring appealed to him more and more. Oh, he wouldn't give up the practice completely; he could never do that to his faithful old patients. But it would be good to have somebody younger to visit all those young families with their sick children at _The Development_, as the ugly new housing estate beyond the stream – the one built on Farmer Giles's fields – was called by the locals.

The doctor chuckled as he locked the front door. New housing estate indeed! _The Development_ had been built in the 1950s and was accordingly run down by now; and yet the oldest generation still considered it as something new and outlandish. Something that didn't really belong to St Mary Mead, even though it was inhabited by the second generation already, and its inhabitants had adapted to the old-fashioned way of life in the village surprisingly well.

With a heartfelt groan, Dr Haydock returned to the drawing room, ready to reward himself for the day's work with a drop of whiskey and a leisurely pipe – no bloody government would prohibit him from having a smoke in his own house, thank you very much! He didn't smoke in the room where he examined his patients, after all.

He was just about to light his pipe when the phone rang. He closed his eyes for a moment, hoping that it wouldn't be a house call; although honestly, what else _could_ it be? Only the locals called him on the landline in these days. Everyone else preferred those bloody mobile phones.

Well, there was no use to delay accepting the inevitable, so he picked up the receiver.

"Dr Haydock, how can I help you?"

"I'd say it's me who can perhaps help you, Doctor," the amused voice of Dr Stamford answered. "I think I may have somebody for you."

"A partner?" Dr Haydock asked, suddenly energised.

Stamford had been such a good, reliable holiday replacement before he'd got that teaching job at _St Bartholomew's Hospital_. And he knew a lot of other useful, reliable people, which had been the reason why Haydock had asked for his help in the first place.

"Possibly, but not one hundred per cent sure yet," Stamford replied. "He wants to see the place for himself before making any decisions."

Dr Haydock breathed out in relief. A male candidate then. Good. Not that he'd have any objections against a female colleague, but even in these days, the conservative base of his clientele would have a hard time accepting a lady doctor.

In certain aspects St Mary Mead was still stuck in the past. It was part of its charm, but it sometimes made things complicated.

"Who is he then?" he asked.

"An old mate of mine, John Watson," Stamford replied. "A very decent chap; we trained together at _Bart's_ but lost touch for a while, as he joined the Army and served three tours in Afghanistan as a trauma surgeon. We met again three years ago when he returned to England."

"But why would he want to move into a sleepy little village like ours?" Haydock asked in surprise. "A trauma surgeon with his experience could get any job he wants at a London hospital."

"No, he can't," Stamford sighed. "He got shot in the left shoulder; there was some nerve damage, and since he's left-handed…"

Stamford drifted off, but Haydock understood at once what that meant.

"He will not operate again," he finished.

"Yeah," Stamford said grimly. "He's been doing locum jobs for the last three years, eking out a living as well as he could. But since his flatmate died a couple of months ago, he can't afford a flat in London on his own and needs to find something else."

Haydock nodded in understanding. Nerve damage in the dominant shoulder was a certain career-killer for a surgeon. Add three tours in a war zone, possible PTSD and the recent death of a flatmate… yes, he could understand why the man would need an urgent change of scenery.

"Well, he's welcome to visit any time he wants," he said. "It's not such a long drive from London after all."

"He'll come by train," Stamford said. "Is Inch still in business? John might need a cab from the railway station."

"Yes, of course, although it's in the hands of the younger generation, like everything else," Haydock replied, wondering a little why Stamford's friend might need a cab. The walk from the railway station to his practice really wasn't a long one. "I'll need a CV and some references, though."

"I can mail you everything," Stamford offered.

"You can," Haydock said dryly, "but it won't do us any good. I don't have a computer in the house."

Stamford laughed. "Good Lord, Haydock, you1re still living in the Dark Ages down there? Very well I'll tell John to pack all his papers; and to make sure he gets wireless internet on his laptop."

"He's got a _laptop_?" Haydock pronounced a word as if speaking of something deeply suspicious.

Stamford laughed again. "Welcome to the twenty-first century, Dr Haydock. You should consider catching up with time a bit, you know. If you _had_ a computer, you could go on the internet and read John's blog. It would tell you a lot about him and spare him the necessity of speaking about things that are still too painful for him to discuss."

"I could read his _what_?" Haydock was suitably confused.

"It's like a diary," Stamford explained. "Just on the internet, so that people can read it and comment on the entries. A good way to keep tab on your mates."

Haydock consciously reminded himself that Stamford was a generation or more younger and saw things differently.

"In my youth, we had this great invention called writing letters," he commanded dryly. "And personal diaries were meant for personal use, not for complete strangers to read them."

"Well, yeah, the world has changed a lot since the Age of Sails," Stamford replied. "Anyway, I have to go. I promised Gwennie to take her out for dinner, and she can be very… _vocal_ when I make her wait."

"I knew there was a reason why I remained a steadfast bachelor," Haydock said.

He had met Gwendolyn Stamford (née Cooper) once, at their wedding, but that had been enough. Stamford took no offence, though.

"Admittedly, she's an acquired taste," he allowed. "But we get on just fine… most of the time. And she makes me laugh – even if she doesn't mean to. All right then, I'll give John the thumbs up and the necessary instructions, and he'll show up eventually. Is there a particular day when he shouldn't come?"

"None," Haydock replied after a brief pause. "I… don't have much of a social life. He can phone me if he wants to make sure that I'm home; otherwise he can wait, should I be visiting one of my patients."

"I'll tell him that," Stamford promised. "I hope the two of you will hit off at once. Good luck, Haydock; till next time."

"Good-bye; and thanks, Stamford."

* * *

Dr Haydock hung up and frowned. He wasn't a friend of mobile phones or computers or other such infernal machines, but in one thing Stamford had been right: learning more about John Watson could be useful.

Even though he still felt it indecent to poke around in another man's life. Regardless the fact that the man displayed said life on the internet, for anyone to see.

But who could help _him_ to see it? His contacts to the younger generation were sporadic at best, and in most cases strictly of medicinal nature. Unless…

His glance wandered over to the Vicarage. Leonard Clement was as old-fashioned as he and almost as old, but his sons… Leonard Junior had moved out a few years ago, but David was still living with his parents… and didn't he have a job in London that had something to do with computers?

The doctor reached for the receiver again, dialled the number of the Vicarage and asked for Daniel Clement.

Ten minutes later he was sitting in the Vicar's study with the younger son of said Vicar, staring at the screen of a laptop. The website they were viewing had the simple title: the personal blog of Dr. John H. Watson and showed, in the upper right corner, the small photo of a man in his late thirties, with a military haircut and a friendly, smiling face.

Under the photo was a short self-introduction, reduced to the barest facts: _I am an experienced medical doctor recently returned from Afghanistan._

The hit counter, whatever _that _was supposed to be, showed the number 1895, and below it a few photos were posted. Haydock recognised the Coliseum of Rome and a few other famous places he only knew from travel guides. Watson must have moved along a lot.

"Not a very imaginative title," David commented. "The last entry is from ten months ago… oh…"

He turned the laptop to the right, so that Haydock could have a better look at said entry.

It simply said: _He was my best friend and I'll always believe in him_.

There was an instruction next to the entry, saying: Read more…

David clicked on the link, but there simply _wasn't_ anything else. Just a piece of info: Comments disabled.

"That's all? Haydock asked, disappointed. "Not a word since then? No details?"

David shook his head. "Nope. You can see that he disabled the comments… and apparently abandoned the blog, too. We can try this embedded video here; perhaps we can learn more that way. Seems to be some cut-out from the news; do you want to watch it?"

Haydock pondered over the offer for a moment, and then nodded. "Yes, please."

~TBC~


	2. Chapter 2: Gossip Girls

**Precious Like Rubies**

**by Soledad**

**Note:** As I mentioned before, I had to screw a bit with the Miss Marple timeline, planting the old lady in the Sherlock era. Hence the fact that Miss Wetherby, who had already passed over by "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side", is still alive, if not exactly kicking in this story

No, this crossover does _not_ include Torchwood – not in the traditional sense anyway. I just use some characters in wastly different roles because… well, because it is _fun_. David Clement is "played" by Jonathan Lewis Owen (Banana Boat from Torchwood). The old ladies are all based on my mother's best friends. *g*

Beta read by Linda Hoyland whom I owe my never-ending gratitude.

* * *

**Chapter 02 – Gossip Girls**

St Mary Mead was a village of proud traditions. Despite the inevitable – and heavily frowned-upon – changes brought by the so-called progress, there were some things that had been done exactly the same way for decades.

One of these things was the Wednesday afternoon tea at the Vicarage. Or, as the Vicar's wife – the dear Griselda, also well beyond fifty but still as vibrant and youthful as ever, despite having two grown sons – liked to call: _tea and scandal at four-thirty_.

_Some things never change; not in St Mary Mead_, Miss Marple thought thankfully as she navigated the pitfalls of the short path from her own cottage to the Vicarage. As the Vicar himself liked to say, their village thrived on humdrum scandal, and even a change in shaving foam was considered a sensation.

The dear Reverend Clement had always been such an innocent, of course. If anyone, Miss Marple knew all too well that even such a sleepy little village had its thieves, impostors, vigilantes, a lot of skulduggery, all sorts of evil… and the odd corpse on the cricket lawn.

That was what she, personally, liked about St Mary Mead, apart from her garden: that it was like a drop of water on a microscope slide, full of life under the seemingly smooth surface.

Her attention had wandered only for a moment, yet that treacherous knee of hers gave way at that very moment, of course. She held on, waiting for the pain to pass, as she knew it would. That wretched knee had been bothering her for nearly ten years, and it played up increasingly often these days.

Perhaps Carol Wetherby had been right. Perhaps she should use a cane, too; or, at the very least, a walking stick. Having something to lean on _might_ help.

On the other hand, using a cane would not necessarily make things easier. Ever since she'd broken her shoulder some eight years ago, she had limited use of her right arm. Oh, she could use it perfectly well… as long as she didn't have to raise it over her head. Or to rely on it while descending any stairs. It didn't hurt – not unless the weather was about to change – but it didn't have the required strength to keep her from falling, to name just one problem. And in no way could she lean with it on a cane.

She shook her head in mild annoyance. Getting old was not always a pleasure, in spite of giving one the chance to make good use of the experiences of a long life. Especially not when one was alone.

"Hullo Aunt Jane!" a cheerful voice greeted her as David Clement caught up with her, offering his arm gallantly. "May I escort you to the Wednesday Tea Club?"

Miss Marple beamed at the young man. No, David was not related to her by blood, wasn't even one of her numerous godsons, but he'd always treated her as one would treat a favourite aunt: fondly, with just a hint of amusement.

"Oh, thank you, David dear, that is very kind of you." She accepted the proffered arm with unashamed delight; it was _so_ much better to be supported by such a nice and caring young man. "I'm afraid my arthritis doesn't react well to these abrupt changes of weather; why, it's positively hot right now, at least compared with yesterday. I wonder if poor Miss Wetherby will be able to make it today."

Miss Caroline Wetherby, Carol to her friends (of whom depressingly few were still alive), was in a much worse shape than all the others. Although of the same age as Miss Marple, she had become a shadow of her old self in the recent years. Fragile and unsteady on her feet, due to the loss of too much weight and a broken thighbone two years previously, she couldn't even leave the house without help. She'd also lost sight in one eye as a result of an unexpected infection not so long ago, and even her hearing had deteriorated rapidly.

For someone who'd lived for gossip all her life, this was a cruel punishment indeed.

"Oh, I think she'll be there all right," David said encouragingly. "Mum spoke to that freakish nurse who lives with her, Elisa or Alicia or whatshername…"

"Erica," Miss Marple corrected. "Her name is Erica Biggs."

The live-in nurse had been employed by Miss Wetherby's loving niece, of course, and she was a strange creature indeed. Thankfully, she was also dutiful and reliable; otherwise Miss Wetherby would have ended up in one of those dreadful nursing homes where the patients were treated as if they were moronic children.

"Who else is invited?" Miss Marple asked, mostly to shake off those unpleasant thoughts, although the answers should have been obvious enough.

"The usual suspects, I'd think," David replied, grinning. "Miss Hartnell, of course; Mrs Price-Ridley; Miss Hubbard from the railway station…"

"She's not _from_ the railway station," Miss Marple corrected pedantically. "She lives in her own, large cottage in High Street, and you know that. Marjorie Hubbard is a dear old friend of mine, and she doesn't like it when people talk about her like she were some homeless person, just because she happens to live near to the railway station, so please don't do it!"

"Yes, Aunt Jane. Sorry, Aunt Jane," David's apology sounded completely insincere but the puppy eyed routine going with it was perfection itself, and despite her iron principles, Miss Marple fell victim to it, like every time since David had first learned to employ it.

"Who else is coming then?" she asked, steering back the conversation to its original topic.

"Dr Haydock," David replied, achieving a mysterious look; for no apparent reason, in Miss Marple's opinion. After all Dr Haydock frequently joined his most faithful patients for the Wednesday afternoon tea at the Vicarage.

"He has _news_," David added in an ominous voice.

Miss Marple knew _that_ voice all too well. It meant that David knew something the others didn't – not yet – but was unwilling (or forbidden) to reveal. In some things the boy hadn't changed since the age of five.

"Well, I'm sure he'll share that news with us, dear," she replied, waiting for David to hold open the door for her.

* * *

_The usual suspects_, as David had called them, had already assembled in the stuffy old drawing-room of the Vicarage when they entered. It was quite a gathering, under the presidency of the dear Griselda, who stood out of the flock of old crows like a peacock in her very nice floral tea dress. With her red curls (their natural colour now discreetly enhanced a little by artificial means), that did not quite touch her shoulders, she looked almost too young for the old, dusty Vicarage. She'd been wearing her hair in the same fashion for at least twenty years, but it still suited her perfectly.

The Reverend Leonard Clement had yet to make an appearance – as he would unfailingly, Miss Marple knew; the Vicar was diligent in his duties toward his flock, no matter how tiresome he might find certain members of said flock. All the others, however, were already present and accounted for.

There was Mrs Martha Price-Ridley, for starters, better known as "that dreadful Price-Ridley" among those who'd ever suffered from her sharp tongue (and honestly, in all those years she'd spent in St Mary Mead, who hadn't?) Once she'd been a tall, handsome, imposing woman, always smartly dressed and a weekly visitor of Mrs Jameson's hairdressing parlour, so that her hairdo would always be perfect.

At the age of eighty-four, she was still tall, smartly dressed and perfectly coiffed. Her hair didn't show the slightest touch of grey, having gone from the earlier pitch black to a softer, more moderate chestnut brown – beauty products were so much better and easier to apply in these days, _one_ change that even the old ladies whole-heartedly welcomed.

But her face was wrinkled beyond what any amount of make-up could have concealed, she'd become somewhat bloated in her midriff, and she was suffering from a number of age-related illnesses, from arthritic joints through digestion problems to the occasional dizzy spell and an unreliable circulation. She was also wearing glasses that, unfortunately, no longer enabled her to do any stitching or knitting, and had picked up the habit of wearing lots of fake jewellery.

None of these inconveniences would hinder her in doing what she felt was right, though. She still worked in her garden as much as she could, despite Dr. Haydock's disapproval.

"That horrible old Leycock can't be left unsupervised," she explained to her friends. "He'd dig out all my rose bushes and plant cabbages instead." As _this_ was, unfortunately, very true, not to mention widely known in the entire village, Dr Haydock found himself short of real arguments whenever the topic came up.

She still attended to every single church service, unless seriously ill. She still regularly visited the graves of her late husband and son in the churchyard. And, of course. She still came to the Wednesday afternoon tea at the Vicarage each week.

Poor Miss Wetherby was sitting a little aside, in the Vicar's own, most comfortable armchair. She had her hair freshly done for the only remaining event in her otherwise uneventful life, spent between hospital visits and sleepless nights. She had taken to wearing trousers lately, ostensibly to cover her dramatic weight loss, but could not quite hide her skeletal looks from the observant eye of her old friends. That she would still have her hair coloured was a bit pathetic, Miss Marple decided with tolerant sadness, but at least she was _trying_ to beat age and illness that were ganging up on her.

Miss Amanda Hartnell, on the other hand – Mandy, as the others called her – was defiantly, gloriously full of energy, in spite of arthritic limbs, hearing problems and the glasses of which she needed stronger ones every other year. She, too, was of Miss Marple's age but certainly didn't look it. Short but trim, she concealed her hearing problem by paying special attention ("None of those hearing aids, dear, they are _so_ clumsy; and they make the background noise much louder than anything you'd actually _want_ to hear!") Her perfectly coiffed hair was a rich, vibrant bronze, and her boundless energy ("I don't have time to waste on arthritic pains, dear!") made her appear much younger than the other ladies, even if all that inner energy often couldn't force the aching joints to actually cooperate.

Not without help, most of the time.

The last in the… _mature_ circle was Miss Hubbard, Miss Marple's best friend and the only other one who preferred greying to artificial hair colours. She was a friendly, somewhat child-like old lady, wearing a blue-and-white patterned dress that looked as if it had come from that cheap little second-hand shop in Market Basing, although Miss Marple happened to know that it had been custom made by a good, old-fashioned dressmaker in the same town.

Poor Marjorie, she _always_ had such an unlucky result at choosing her wardrobe.

David Clement joined the gathering for a short while, much to the ladies' delight. He was very popular among the older generation, the reason for that being, in equal parts, his fleeting likeness to a younger Prince William, the fact that he was the Vicar's son and his willingness to help anyone who found the wonders of modern technology utterly confusing.

After discussing the possible future of Gossington Hall, now that Mrs Bantry had the estate back, after the tragic demise of that American actress, Marina Gregg, who had owned the Hall for a very short time – most of the ladies believed in turning it into an old-fashioned hotel ("Not everyone likes those horrible glass and concrete cubes, you see…") – the conversation turned to the actual sensation of the day: the new owner of Chatsworth.

The property one mile down Lansham Road from Gossington Hall had once been a very modern cottage, also known as the "Period Piece" and "Mr Booker's new house". It was a rather hideous mix of half timbering and mockTudor, situated on a building estate that had been bought by the enterprising Mr Baker just beyond the _Blue Boar_, with a view that – at that time – had been a particularly unspoiled country lane.

The fact that it had earned those names more than sixty years previously didn't hinder the ladies in still calling it so.

"I've just heard from Mrs Ponsonby, you know, my old school friend, who lives in Welford and whose nephew is a trainee lawyer at Mr Pretherick's – the _younger_ Mr Pretherick, of course," Miss Hartnell leaned forward in her armchair excitedly, "that some American pilot's bought Chatsworth, less than a month ago. Some Captain Harmon or Harper or…"

"Harkness," Mrs Price Ridley corrected. "Captain Jack Harkness. That's what the boy's told that Janet girl, the one that works at Mrs Jamieson's,"

Miss Marple nodded in mute approval. Janet was one of those young girls already born in _The Development_; and a friendly and cheerful one at that, who appeared to absorb news like a sponge absorbed water. Which was a good thing, as since there no longer were servants and maids available to provide the old ladies with juicy pieces of gossip, one had to become dependent on shop assistants and the likes more than ever.

Plus, Janet was a level-headed girl who preferred to have reliable sources for her news. Like Mrs Ponsonby's nephew who, if one could believe Miss Marple's housekeeper, Cherry, had 'a thing' for Janet, and who worked for the local solicitors and therefore sat at the very source of a great deal of useful information.

"An American solider is coming to live in St. Mary Mead, of all places?" Reverend Clement asked in surprise. Miss Marple couldn't really blame him. Their sleepy little village wouldn't have much attraction for a worldly person.

"Nah," David said. "He's a civilian pilot, working for a private firm called _Torchwood Airlines_. And he isn't actually American, just lived there for a long time. Until his parents moved back to Scotland, that is."

Griselda Clement gave her son a stern look. "And how do _you_ know about that?"

She wasn't against gossip on principle; life in St. Mary Mead would have been deadly boring without gossip – or without considerable efforts _not_ to become the object of local gossip – but she didn't want it to start from the Vicarage. That would have harmed Len's reputation.

David shrugged. "Pub night at the _Blue Boar_ with Idris Hopper," he replied curtly.

Idris Hopper was the trainee lawyer working for _Pretherick & Son_'s; a well-mannered young man whom the old ladies watched with deep suspicion nonetheless, because he seemed to prefer male company. Which, of course, could have completely innocent reasons… unless one asked the retired furies of St. Mary Mead. "Innocent reasons" was a foreign concept to the formidable ladies.

"You shouldn't socialise with that young man, David," Miss Wetherby announced (after her caretaker had explained her what had just been said. "People might think you were of his kind."

"Of _what_ kind exactly, Miss Wetherby?" David asked with poisonous sweetness. He liked the old ladies as a rule – especially Miss Marple – but there were times when their bigotry annoyed him to no end.

"Well, we all know that he's _very_ close to that new librarian who works in the library of Market Basing," Miss Hubbard said, almost apologetically. "He has a strange name. Something Welsh, I think, but I can't remember…"

"Jones," David said. "Ianto Jones. And yes, they _are_ close. They went to school together and kept in touch ever since. Is that a crime?"

"Of course not, but if two young men are _too_ close…"

"… it could actually mean that they've known each other for quite some time and are good friends," Dr Haydock interrupted before the talk could have become truly malevolent, which was always a possibility when Mrs Price-Ridley and Miss Wetherby were in the same room. "Nothing wrong with that."

The ladies seemed less certain that they'd agree, so Griselda smoothly intervened.

"What kind of name is _Ianto_ anyway?" she asked. "Sounds really strange."

"It's Welsh for Johnny," David explained. "Shortened from Ifan, actually, but counts as a proper name of its own by now. Anyway, Idris told me that this Captain Harkness does long-distance flights, to Thailand and other such places, and wanted a house closer to London, cause it would be a nuisance to drive up from that nest in Scotland where his parents live each time."

He named a tiny little place no-one but Miss Marple had heard of before. She, however, _was_ familiar with that name. It was the same little town where her old friend, Elspeth McGillicuddy had lived for decades by now.

What a strange coincidence, she thought. Perhaps a phone call to dear Elspeth wouldn't be amiss. It's always reassuring to know who the people moving into the village truly are, and Elspeth would know the family, at least.

It was strange to imagine anyone new – especially one of those smart and handsome American pilots – moving into Chatswood. In Miss Marple's mind _that_ place was bound forever to Basil Blake, the rebellious young film-maker from the _Lenville Studios_, to his wife, that peroxide-blonde actress, Diana… no, Dinah Lee; and, of course, that poor girl that had been found in front of the fireplace in the library of Gossington Hall, dead. Strangled.

She shook her head with mild disapproval. Lingering in the past was not a good thing. Chatswood had stood alone for a very long time; one should be grateful that people where moving _into_ St Mary Mead again.

She found herself saying so, and her old friends nodded in agreement.

"Well, for that matter," Dr Haydock said contentedly, "Captain Harkness may not be the only one moving here. If we're lucky, I might get a partner for the practice, soon."

The news struck like a hand grenade thrown into a sleepy fishing pond. Especially Miss Wetherby was devastated by the thought of losing Dr Haydock as her personal physician. Not that Haydock could do anything else for her than keeping her relatively pain free, but still…

"I'm too old to get used to a new doctor," she declared crossly, and that ghastly nurse of hers, too, gave the doctor accusing looks.

"Oh, I'm sure Dr Haydock wouldn't abandon you, Carol dear," Miss Marple said a bit forcefully, which was the only way to keep Miss Wetherby from slithering into full-blown self-pity. "But he's not a young man anymore, and I imagine that all those young families in _The Development_ give him too much legwork."

"Quite right, Miss Marple," Dr Haydock said, smiling. "Somebody younger is needed to deal with the younger generation. Somebody who can keep up with them."

"How much younger _are_ we talking about?" Mrs Price-Ridley demanded. "We need somebody with proper experience, in case Doctor Haydock isn't available."

"Not _that_ young, Mrs Price-Ridley," Haydock assured her. "Dr Watson went to medical school with Dr Stamford, if you still remember him. They're roughly the same age."

The old ladies _did_ remember chubby, mild-mannered Dr Stamford, of course; him who'd always been so kind and patient with them, whenever he came to replace Dr Haydock during holidays. He'd been a bit young, true, but very thorough and reliable, with excellent manners – something of a rarity from the younger generation.

"Was it Dr Stamford who suggested this Doctor… Watson was his name?" Miss Marple asked, cutting to the core at once. Dr Haydock nodded.

"Yes, they're old friends. Look, I know that Mike Stamford isn't exactly the best judge of character, but…"

"Oh, I wouldn't say _that_," Miss Marple interrupted. "He may be a little… naïve in certain things, but he's got a sharp mind under that placid surface; and he's very loyal. Just like the butcher's apprentice, David… David Nellist, yes, that was his name. Everybody thought him to be a bit… _slow_ in the head, you know, and perhaps he was, too, that poor dear, but it seemed as if God had given him an instinctive feeling for people's true character in exchange. _And_ he was very loyal, too, which saved his master from a false accusation in that terrible murder case, if you remember."

Several heads nodded in unison. The murder case of the chemist's wife was one the village would not forget easily.

"I wouldn't call Mike Stamford exactly slow in the head," Dr Haydock said mildly. "He wouldn't be able to teach in medical school if he were."

"No, of course not; that wasn't what I was saying," Miss Marple replied. "Now, can you tell us something more about this Dr Watson?"

"I don't know much more myself," Dr Haydock confessed. "Watson was an Army doctor, served three tours in Afghanistan, got shot when stabilising some gravely injured soldiers on the battlefield and was invalided home. Did some locum jobs in London and apparently wants something more permanent now. I can understand that a war veteran would need a little peace and quiet."

That actually made sense. But he wasn't telling them everything; Miss Marple was certain about that. There was something very unpleasant, perhaps even tragic behind the ex-Army doctor's sudden decision to leave London and bury himself in a sleepy little village. Something Dr Haydock didn't want to become the topic of local gossip.

Miss Marple understood that. But mysteries were a thing she could never withstand and, she admitted to herself ruefully, this case wouldn't be any different. Were she a cat, her curiosity would have killed her a long time ago.

And she did have the means to find out more. The library of Market Basing kept the most important papers for a year. She could look up more recent articles and search for possible reasons.

And then there was Chief Inspector Craddock, Sir Henry Clithering's godson. The dear Dermot had retired a few years ago, but he still had his _contacts_, and he'd doubtlessly use them to find the missing pieces of the puzzle for his beloved honorary Aunt.

Satisfied with her research plan, Miss Marple leaned back in her seat, accepted another cup of tea from the dear Griselda and rejoined the conversation that had turned to the robbery committed by the Skinner sisters in the block of flats that had once been the Old Hall, the mansion of the late Colonel Lucius Protheroe, the despised local magistrate.

Some aspects of that robbery still seemed a bit unclear, and the ladies presented their own theories with enthusiasm.

~TBC~


	3. Chapter 3: Miss Marple Makes Inquiries

**Precious Like Rubies**

**by Soledad**

**Note:** The two paragraphs about _Inch's Taxi Service_ are taken from "The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side", with small alterations to make it fit more modern times.

The articles Miss Marple reads are transcripts from the show, of course. My sincerest thanks to Adriane DeVere who put them up on her website. She spared me the necessity of killing my eyes on the subtitles.

And no, _this_ Ianto Jones isn't the Ianto Jones from Torchwood. He just looks the same and behaves similarly. _And_ he, too, makes heavenly coffee. *g*

My heartfelt thanks go to my good friend, Linda Hoyland, for her valuable advice concerning the British press and for cleaning up my… erm… _creative_ grammar. *hugs*

* * *

**Chapter 03 – Miss Marple Makes Inquiries**

Miss Marple planned her excursion to the library very carefully. It was a much longer trip than a visit at the Vicarage, therefore she needed to make certain preparations. Preparations that included _Inch's Taxi Service_, one of the oldest institutions in St Mary Mead.

In the very old days, Mr Inch had owned two cabs, which met trains at the local station and were also hired by the local ladies to take them out to tea parties, and occasionally, with their daughters, to such frivolous entertainments as dances. Later on Inch, at the age of seventy-odd years, handed over the business to his son – known as 'young Inch '(he was then aged forty-five) though old Inch still continued to drive such elderly ladies as considered his son too young and irresponsible.

To keep up with the times, young Inch renewed their modest business, stock of cars. Unfortunately, he was not technically savvy, and the business took an immediate nose-dive. So much that he had to sell it to a certain Mr Bardwell within a shockingly short time. The name Inch persisted, however, as it was a well-known and much trusted one. Mr Bardwell, after a not so long time, sold it to Mr Roberts, but in the telephone book _Inch's Taxi Service_ was still the official name, and the older ladies of St Mary Mead still referred to their journeys as going somewhere 'in Inch', as though they were Jonah and Inch was a whale.

Mr Roberts, a distinguished, middle-aged man, was as reliable as the founder of the business he'd owned for more than a decade by now. He pulled up his old-fashioned black cab in front of Danemead Cottage right on time. He did employ one other driver, of course – more wouldn't have been needed in such a small village – but, just like old Inch, he preferred to drive his treasured old customers himself.

"Good morning, Miss Marple," he greeted one of said treasured old customers cheerfully. "Where are we going today?"

"_I am_ going to the library in Marked Basing," Miss Marple replied. She never liked it when people treated her as a slow-minded child; unfortunately, most people tended to be a bit patronising in these days, just because she was elderly and, admittedly, somewhat fragile. "And I'd be grateful if you could collect me when I'm finished there. I might be a couple of hours, though."

"Of course, Miss Marple; you call me and I'll come," Roberts promised while helping her into the cab. "You do have a mobile phone, don't you?"

"Oh, yes, dear Raymond – that's my nephew, you know, the writer, he's _so_ very helpful – has bought me one of those… _things_," Miss Marple replied doubtfully. "He's even programmed the numbers I'd need most into it or whatever it's called. I could never manage to use it otherwise. Things today are all so unnecessarily complicated."

"Perhaps," Roberts allowed. "Still, mobile phones can make things a lot easier. They're very practical, if nothing else."

That much Miss Marple had to grudgingly admit, and so they set off to Market Basing in companionable silence.

* * *

Like all towns in the neighbourhood, Market Basing had also experienced its growth spurt after the war, and another substantial one less than ten years ago. However, the old _Town Library_ was still situated in a modest little two-storey building of white stone in the picturesque London Street – a nostalgic lane in the old town centre, which included a delightful variety of architecture from the 17th through the 20th century. Each building was unique, none of them taller than three storeys, and the entire street had a nice, homely feeling about it.

It felt like stepping back into Miss Marple's youth. It felt _good_.

Of course, not even London Street could escape from the inevitable changes of progress… whatever _that_ was supposed to mean. The _Town Library_ was merely a relic from earlier times, long overshadowed by the large, modern _New Library_, situated in the tall, cylindrical glass and chrome tower of _Festival Place_ that landmarked the new town. But some of the old shops still flourished, albeit long kept by different owners, and the shop fronts and signs above them had been lovingly restored, consciously giving the entire street the nowadays so popular vintage look.

Miss Marple found that one had to be grateful for the quirks of fashion sometimes.

The only new shop was _Ianto's Coffee Heaven_ – a small, cosy little café that shared the shop front with the _Library_… and more than just that. It was actually owned by the young librarian, Ianto Jones, who – according to dear David, who'd heard it from Idris Hopper, of course – had worked as a barista at an Italian café in London during his university years to cover his study fees. His coffee was said to be quite extraordinary, and given how little traffic the _Library_ saw these days, he could easily operate both places through the door connecting them that usually stood open.

Miss Marple hadn't visited the _Library_ since young Mr Jones had taken it over two… no, three years previously. She rarely left St Mary Mead unless it was necessary, like today. But dear Griselda often came here, sometimes together with her Reverend husband (who required the oddest books for his sermons occasionally), and they both spoke highly of the young man's skills and manners.

Considering what diagonal opposites they were, _that_ was saying a lot. Therefore, Miss Marple was looking forward to finally meeting the young man in person. She liked young people who were still full of life and energy and plans for the future. They made her feel young again.

Inch – well, _Roberts_ – helped her out of the taxi, pocketed his fare, promised again to come and fetch her at the first phone call, and then left. Miss Marple stood hesitantly in front of the _Library_'s shop window – still, or rather again, painted a bright, warm orange colour that stood off pleasantly from the white stone – and then she gave the glass door an experimental push. It swung inward smoothly, ringing an old-fashioned little bronze bell hung above the entrance to signal the arrival of a customer. Just as it always had.

At the signal, a tall young man rose from behind a desk facing the door – it had a bulky, old-fashioned computer screen standing on it, the sort that dear David called 'an outdated dinosaur' – and came to greet her. He had short, neat brown hair, a friendly, almost child-like face with a button nose and grey-blue eyes. He was wearing a fitted, pin-striped three-piece suit… well, two pieces of it anyway, as his suit jacket was carefully arranged on a hanger and hung on the mantle rack behind his back, with a purple shirt and a navy tie, the later expertly knotted in a half-Windsor.

"Good morning, ma'am," he said with a friendly smile. He had a soft voice with a slight Welsh lilt in it. "Can I help you?"

"Yes, as a matter of fact I believe you can," Miss Marple replied. "It won't be an easy thing, though, I'm afraid."

The young man's smile broadened. "Good. I like a challenge. Why don't we sit in the café and you tell me over a latte what can I do for you?"

"Well, I don't know," Miss Marple said, a bit uncertainly. "It's quite early for coffee; I'm no longer allowed to have more than one cup a day – my heart, you know; I'm not getting any younger – and I might need the caffeine later, to concentrate. I don't suppose that you serve, you know, _tea_ in this café of yours?"

"Not as a rule," the young man replied. "But I'll make an exception for David Clement's favourite aunt."

"You know who I am?" Miss Marple didn't know whether to be shocked or flattered.

The young man laughed. "Actually, I'm cheating, ma'am. David called me, first thing in the morning, and said you might stop by. The _Inch _cab was quite the give-away. David likes to tell me tales about St Mary Mead. Now, if you'd come with me, we could make ourselves comfortable and you can explain me what you need from me."

* * *

Ten minutes later Miss Marple was sitting in the lovely, old-fashioned little café (it had only four tables), a cup of fragrant jasmine tea on the small, round marble table in front of her – not what she'd usually drink, but excellent nonetheless – waiting for whatever Ianto Jones could dig out for her. The only other customer was a young Japanese woman in the reading room of the _Library_, surrounded by technical manuals and working on her laptop with great concentration.

_Must be a student, working on her dissertation_, Miss Marple decided. Mrs Bantry's oldest daughter used to have this focused look on her when she had been studying. So many girls chose to have a career nowadays, scientific or otherwise. Miss Marple wondered sometimes if it truly made them happy, the poor dears.

Well, at least it made them self-confident and even independent, in most cases. Which, in her books, was a good thing. A very good thing indeed.

She wondered if the friendly young librarian could find her anything useful. Her instructions had been rather vague: anything tragic or unusual concerning a certain Dr John Watson, in his late thirties, served in Afghanistan, wounded and invalided home. It hadn't been much, but Ianto muttered something about Google and internet research, consulted his computer for a moment, and then bounded up the squeaky wooden stairway to the upper level, where the newspaper archives were situated.

It took Ianto Jones exactly twenty-four minutes to return with a pile of newspapers from the last eleven months, already neatly ordered by date.

"These should cover the basics," he said. "Unfortunately, I'd already left London when the big scandal broke out, but I vaguely remember following it on the telly and the internet. I've brought some from _before_ all hell broke loose and some from afterwards, so that you have the means to compare press reactions."

Miss Marple thanked him and started to work herself through the ten-inch-thick pile meticulously. The article on top – accidentally the front page of the _Daily Mail_ – bore the title.

**HAT-MAN & ROBIN – THE WEB DETECTIVES BECAME THE LATEST INTERNET SENSATION**

Under the title was a fairly large picture of a man in a deerstalker, adamantly refusing to look into the camera, making futile attempts to hide behind his upturned coat collar. A little further behind him was another man with a military stance: a short, blond man with a lot of grey in his hair and with tired blue eyes.

The article began in the usual sensationalist style of the tabloids. _Since moving in together, the pair of confirmed bachelors have helped bumbling police chiefs with a number of high-profile cases. From a killer psycho taxi driver to the murder of ePeopleis Presenter Connie Prince, they've often succeeded where the Met has failed._

Miss Marple shook her head. She had missed the case of that serial killer cab driver, having spent some time in the Caribbean to recover from a serious case of bronchitis, thanks to the generosity of dear Raymond, but Connie Price's murder case was almost embarrassingly simple, in her opinion.

Once one had peeled away all the artificial constructs that seemed to surround every so-called media personality (which, she found, was a really silly name for cheap entertainers), one stumbled upon the obvious motivation: hatred on somebody else's behalf. And while Miss Marple didn't condone murder on principle, she was not the least surprised by this particular one. Connie Price was – had been – a most unpleasant woman who made a career out of insulting and humiliating people, including her own brother.

If that was what people saw as entertainment today, Miss Marple would gladly remain bored for the rest of her life. Unfortunately, that wouldn't be a very long time anyway.

She sighed and returned to the article that took an even more personal turn:

_Little is known about Sherlock himself but John, 37, is believed to have been a war hero in Afghanistan. Now, the brave soldier has turned from fighter to writer. His blog,__ www._

_ .uk__, has become an overnight sensation. It details the cases he and Sherlock have solved and also reveals the salacious truth about their home life!_

_Salacious truth_? Miss Marple withstood the urge to roll her eyes in the most un-ladylike manner. It seemed that the only thing most journalists in these days were interested in was to find some sexual subtext in every situation. Why couldn't two gentlemen simply share a flat, out of necessity – or practicality – as it had been done for decades? Somehow, she couldn't imagine that Dr Stamford would suggest a doctor for St Mary Mead who would discuss his… _romantic_ activities openly.

Deciding that she needed more information, Miss Marple laid the _Daily Mail_ to the side and picked up the _Daily Express_. The first part of the article of the _Daily Express_ was word-for-word the same as the one before but continued like this: _"A Study in Pink" was the first of these cases to be chronicled by Watson. It tells of a taxi driver who, believing himself to be some kind of vengeful god, murdered a number of his passengers… _

Miss Marple laid the _Daily Express _aside with an annoyed huff. This was _not_ what she needed. She could look up Dr Watson's report herself, instead of reading some journalist's second-hand summary that probably missed all the important details. She couldn't use a computer on her own, but the _Library_ had one, and young Mr Jones was very helpful. Or she could ask dear David to help her later. But first, she needed to learn everything she could from these articles.

She picked up the _Observer_ next, hoping for slightly more common sense and definitely more details. Although the title made her doubt if that would be so.

**Sherlock & John**

**Blogger Detectives**

Once again, it repeated the stupid first article, complete with the tasteless _salacious truth_ comment. Then, after something about Facebook and Twitter that Miss Marple didn't understand, it said: _The explosion in Baker Street that took the lives of six people was blamed, by the authorities, on a gas leak. John __Watson__ sensationally revealed on his blog that the devastation was actually caused by a mad terrorist bomber known as Jim Moriarty. Links between Moriarty and Al-Qaeda have yet to be ruled out._

_Al-Qaeda, for God's sake_! Miss Marple thought in dismay. Why do people always blame some shadowy terrorist group for everything when there were more than enough criminals in England itself, ready and willing to harm others; and they couldn't even provide a higher motivation than simple greed or hatred.

Not that Miss Marple would accept _any_ motivation was high enough to murder the innocent.

The name Moriarty, however, _did_ click. Her interests had turned almost exclusively towards her immediate surroundings in the recent years, but she seemed to remember some big scandal in London in connection with that name.

Perhaps the article would reveal more?

_It appears that Sherlock and John are untouchable – feared by the police and criminals alike. But for how long can this be the case? Will there come a time when sensationally revealed on his blog that the Hat-Man and Robin's luck changes? And, if so, what will this mean for…_

Miss Marple lowered the paper. She wasn't interested in any more _sensational_ revealings. Sometimes she thought if she had to hear or read _sensational_ one more time, she'd scream. Besides, a quick glance of the date told her that the article was almost a year old already.

She laid it aside and picked up the next one. It showed a photo of the uncomfortable-looking detective (and his faithful shadow) on the front page, with the title:

**Hero of the Reichenbach**

The headlines read: **Turner masterpiece recovered by 'amateur'**; **Scotland Yard embarrassed by overlooked clues.**

Miss Marple shook her head. In her experience, the police weren't stupid. They might be a bit slow at times, a bit too fond of their time-honoured methods, but they weren't stupid; and alienating them was never a good idea. She returned to the main text of the article, which read:

_A Turner masterpiece worth £1.7million that was stolen from an auction house ten days ago has been recovered by an amateur detective from North London. Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street has been investigating the art crime simply as a hobby, and yet he was able to follow the trail that led him to the famous work – a trail that Scotland Yard missed completely. Sherlock Holmes has gained __a__ cult following __with__ the publication of his website – The Science of Deduction ..._

No. This wasn't what she needed, either. She did remember dear Joan, Raymond 's wife mentioning the theft to her in one of her rare letters – she _was_ an artist, after all, even if one of the modern ones – but there was nothing in that case that could have caused Dr Watson to suddenly decide he wanted to move to a sleepy little village.

_Well, well. Perhaps the next one will bring some light into this mysterious case_, she thought, although her hopes were quickly dwindling. The next headline announced:

**Top Banker Kidnapped**

And the text following it read: _Sherlock Holmes was last night being hailed a hero yet again for masterminding the daring escape of the kidnapped man. Scotland Yard had to secretly bring in their special weapon (in the form of Mr Holmes) yet again. The case has drawn a huge amount of attention as the nation became divided about the outcome of the kidnapping. Bankers are certainly not the nation's sweethearts any more, but Mr. Holmes certainly seems to be. As huge crowds gathered for the press conference, Mr Holmes was presented with a gift from..._

Below the article was a photograph again, clearly outside the banker's house, with the rescued man standing with his arms around his wife and young son as the press filmed and took photographs of them. The detective and his friend stood uncomfortably nearby. It was followed by an interview with the banker, who said:

_Back together with my family after my terrifying ordeal; and we have one person to thank for my deliverance – Sherlock Holmes…_

It went on in the same gushing manner for several paragraphs, which Miss Marple opted _not_ to read. She turned to the next newspaper instead, which provided a little more background to the kidnapping case, under the title:

**Ricoletti evades capture**

The article suggested that the man named in the headline was responsible for the banker's kidnapping. Followed by an interview with the police officer leading the investigation, one Detective Inspector Lestrade, who said:

_Peter Ricoletti: number one on Interpol's Most Wanted list since nineteen eighty-two. But we got him; and there's one person we have to thank for giving us the decisive leads ... with all his customary diplomacy and tact…_

Who, apparently, was no other than the much-appreciated private detective, Sherlock Holmes. A later edition of the _Daily Star_ printed a World Exclusive on its front page:

**Boffin Sherlock solves ANOTHER**

With the strapline: **Hero 'Tec cracks 'unsolvable' case**

The _Daily Express_ has somehow obtained the security image with a message GET SHERLOCK clear on some glass door, and had run it on its front page with the headline:

**Crime of the Century?**

The rest of the text read: _Questions are being asked in parliament as to how the Tower of London, Pentonville Prison and the Bank of England were all broken into at the same time by the same man – James Moriarty. There are unconfirmed reports that Scotland Yard's favourite sleuth Mr Sherlock Holmes has been called in to help the team piece together the most audacious crime._

Miss Marple shook her head. Her own definition of _audacious_ was clearly a different one from that of the tabloid press. But again, she came from a different time. Definitions ought to have changed in half a century… and more.

She chose a somewhat later edition of the _Daily Mail_ next, the front page headline of which said:

**Jewel Thief on trial at Bailey**

While the first few paragraphs read: _Crown Jewel thief is to be tried at the Old Bailey and Sherlock Holmes is named as a witness for the prosecution. Master criminal Moriarty taunted Holmes with his graffitied GET SHERLOCK at the scene of the crime. The crime is attracting huge attention internationally too. Irish born Moriarty – of no fixed abode, seems to be taunting the master detective. Boffin Holmes, accompanied by confirmed bachelor John Watson – refused to comment. Crowds gathered yesterday for what is being described as the trial of the century_.

Miss Marple now truly regretted having spent those very weeks in the Caribbean, convalescing. Yes, one could gather a great deal of information from the press, but every single piece of said information was usually biased, one way or another. She made a mental note to consult Dermot Craddock as soon as possible. This time, she felt, half-truths or journalistic inventions wouldn't be enough.

Her next choice, _The Guardian_, led with the headline:

**Amateur detective to be called as expert witness**

and followed with the heading: **Scotland Yard calls upon 'nation's favourite detective' in Moriarty trial**

There was also a picture of Mr Holmes putting on a really silly-looking deerstalker hat at the Scotland Yard press conference and the text read: _Mr Sherlock Holmes was yesterday revealed to be an expert witness at the trial of 'Jim' Moriarty. Described by many commentators as the trial of the century, the case has all the ingredients of a block buster film. The royal family, Scotland Yard, the world of finance and greed, the 'underclass' of prisoners out to wreak revenge as they enjoy their own fifteen minutes of freedom. The case is riddled with irony and intrigue but perhaps reflects a deeper malaise that seems to be at the heart of a society. Mr Holmes, a man of few words, declined to comment when asked his involvement in the case. It is understood that a woefully depleted Scotland _..."

Oh, dear! Miss Marple shook her head sadly. It seemed as if the press – on their wild hunt for the next exciting story – had done their best (or worst) to alienate the private detective from Scotland Yard. In the long run, that couldn't have been a good thing.

She picked up the next morning's edition of the _Daily Express_, the front page headline of which practically screamed in double sized bold fonts.

**MORIARTY WALKS FREE**

with the heading: **Shock verdict at Old Bailey trial**

The opening paragraph read: _The Judge could only look on dumbfounded as the Jury found 'Jimbo' Moriarty 'Not Guilty'. Gasps were heard around the courtroom as the Jury declared their verdict._

_The Guardian_ declared: **Shock verdict at trial**

_and the article began: In an unbelievable turn of events Moriarty walked free today after putting up no defence at all for what has been described as the Trial of the Century. Star witness Sherlock Holmes was not present for the verdict, as in another twist to the case was thrown out of court by the Judge. Questions have been asked in Parliament and the Prime Minister was quoted as saying "This is a disgrace, a sign if ever we needed one that broken Britain is still broken..." _

The _Daily Star_ went with: **How was he ever acquitted?**

Some time later _The Guardian_ declared: **Moriarty vanishes,** while on one of its inside pages was a cartoon caricature of Mr Holmes holding a crystal ball with the caption underneath reading, **What Next for the Reichenbach Hero?**

Miss Marple nodded with a sickening feeling. That was to be expected. The press tended to turn against its former favourites, once they stopped providing the big news it required on a daily basis.

She eyed the remaining papers warily. They were dated from two months later and seemed to prove her suspicions about the fickle nature of the press.

The headline of _The Sun_ read: **SHERLOCK: THE SHOCKING TRUTH**

with the heading: **Close Friend Richard Brook Tells All**. The article revealed that it was an Exclusive from Kitty Riley and the text read: _Super-sleuth Sherlock Holmes has today been exposed as a fraud in a revelation that will shock his new found base of adoring fans. Out-of-work actor Richard Brook revealed exclusively to THE SUN that he was hired by Holmes in an elaborate deception to fool the British public into believing Holmes had above-average 'detective skills'. Brook, who has known Holmes for decades and until recently considered him to be a close friend, said he was at first desperate for the money, but later found he had no_…

Miss Marple read the article to the last letter, and then just sat there, thinking about the unexpectedly vicious turn of the press against their former hero. Yes, it _was_ a typical reaction for the tabloids, but she couldn't quite shake the nagging suspicion that there were more… personal aspects to this particular case.

The next headline of The Sun was, if possible, even more vicious:

**SUICIDE OF FAKE GENIUS**

and the straplines stated: **SUPER-SLEUTH IS DEAD**

and: **Fraudulent detective takes his own life**

A particularly mean-spirited article followed, discussing the jump of Sherlock Holmes from the roof of _St Bartholomew's Hospital_, together with his so-called confession with a glee that was beyond disgusting.

Yes, definitely a personal motivation from the journalist's side. What was her name again? Kitty Riley? She seemed to consider it her personal crusade to destroy the reputation of the dead man. Just like that horribly inept girl who used to work for Mr Pretherick – the _older_ Mr Pretherick – went on to distribute mean-spirited gossip _after_ Mr Pretherick's death. Gossip about poor Mr Pretherick accepting bribes from his clients and harassing the girl typists working for him. All that because Mr Pretherick fired her for having lost an important document that led to the loss of an important case.

* * *

Miss Marple laid aside _The Sun_ – such an _unpleasant_ paper, really, she never stooped low enough to read it, which, in this particular case, might have been a mistake – and nodded in sad understanding. Yes, _this_ explained a lot; at least why Dr Watson would want to leave London and stay in a small village where – hopefully – nobody had ever heard of him.

That poor man! Miss Marple made a solemn decision _not_ to tell anyone what she'd found out. The good doctor deserved a break. He must be devastated!

Which didn't mean that _she_ wouldn't want to know more – especially about the enigmatic Mr Holmes. It was hard to judge an already dead person whom she'd never met, of course, but from what little she could find out about him from the papers – simple facts, not half-truths or wild guesswork – he must have been a bit like a friend of Miss Marple's father, that chemistry professor: brilliant, arrogant, with an expressive vocabulary (especially the insults) and an upper class accent, always sharply dressed, unconsciously showing off his privileged background. People used to admire him but very few of them had actually _liked_ him because he'd made them feel inferior all the time.

Still, this Mr Holmes couldn't have been an incorrigible snob if he'd chosen an invalided ex-Army doctor as a friend. Because Dr Watson might have been standing modestly in the background on most pictures, but it was obvious that the two had been close. Very close.

Oh, not in the way some of those horrible tabloids would suggest! Miss Marple had seen enough of _that_ sort of closeness in her long life, often before the people in question would realise it themselves, and she dared to say that _this_ was different. Dr Watson and the enigmatic (and now, sadly, deceased) Sherlock Homes had loved and admired each other in the way of those deep friendships that had once been known between men but had become woefully rare nowadays.

Presumably _because_ people would react to it the same stupid, twisted way as the tabloids did. Freedom of the press was a good thing, in principle, but it could also cause a lot of damage.

* * *

Young Mr Jones came over from the reading room, set a fresh cup of jasmine tea in front of her, this time with a couple of ginger biscuits, and gave her a friendly smile.

"Have you found what you were looking for, ma'am?" he asked.

Miss Marple nodded thoughtfully. "Oh yes, I think I have, my dear. Most interesting articles. Most interesting indeed. I wonder, though, if this Sherlock Holmes – what a strange name! – wasn't the genuine item, after all."

Ianto did something with the complicated looking coffee machine – it was big, shiny and visibly old, with more tubes and taps than one man could justifiably learn to operate, all gleaming copper and chrome – produced himself a cup of aromatic coffee and sat down at her table.

"As I said, I wasn't in London at that time," he replied. "But somehow, I doubt he could have faked all those cases. I mean, he worked for the Yard for how long? Five _years_? Somebody ought to have noticed _something_. Besides, that Richard Brook chap? There's never been an actor by that name; not to my knowledge. And those audio CDs, with the recorded children's books? Those weren't the genuine items, produced by any official publisher, either."

Miss Marple took a sharp breath. Now they were getting somewhere. "Are you sure about that?" she asked.

The young man nodded. "Quite sure. We specialise in audio books for children and have an agreement with every publisher in the country. If that thing had been genuine, we'd have got a copy through the usual channels."

"You have not?"

"Nope. Never heard of them before… or of the guy who'd supposedly recorded them."

"But why hasn't anyone noticed if the records were genuine?" Miss Marple wondered.

Ianto shrugged. "I guess it takes a librarian – and one who often has to do with children's audio books – to notice such things. Besides, I doubt that the tabloid press would be interested in such minor technicalities. Not when they've got a former hero to tear apart."

"I'm afraid that's very true," Miss Marple sighed.

The young man gave her a searching look. "Any reason you've taken such an interest, ma'am? The whole thing is almost a year old."

"I'm afraid it's a private matter," Miss Marple replied apologetically. "But you've been very helpful, my dear. Very helpful indeed. Thank you."

"Do you want me to dig a little more?" Ianto offered. "I might find more recent data on the internet."

"You'd do that?" Miss Marple asked, pleasantly surprised.

Ianto laughed. "Sure, why not? As you see, I've got more than enough time for private research here. The interest in the _Library_ isn't exactly overwhelming. A good thing that it's owned by the town and I'm just an employee."

"Well, in that case," Miss Marple fumbled in her handbag and found one of those fancy cards dear Raymond insisted to have made for her and that she hardly ever used and handed it to the young man. "You can reach me on this number. Now if you could help me with this infernal phone of mine; I need to call Inch."

~TBC~


	4. Chapter 4: First Impressions

**Precious Like Rubies**

**by Soledad**

**Note:** Dr Haydock has been modelled after our old family doctor who'd died a few years ago, at the age of 82. No likeness to any TV-version here; I wanted to pay homage to a wonderful person I'd known half my life.

Some lines of description concerning St Mary Mead have been taken from the novels "The Murder at the Vicarage", "The Mirror Crack'd From Side to Side" and "The Moving Finger", respectively, with small alterations to adapt them to modern times. Sherlock said his piece about the little old ladies in the unaired pilot.

Beta read by the most generous Linda Hoyland, whom I owe my never-ending gratitude.

* * *

**Chapter 04 – First Impressions**

John got off the local train at the station at St. Mary Mead, shouldered his small Army-issue duffel bag – he'd packed an overnight bag, just in case – and took an interested look around, leaning heavily on his cane. His psychosomatic limp had returned after Sherlock's death with a vengeance, and he now contemplated the logistics of finding his destination in an unknown village of unknown dimensions with a certain amount of dread.

Where should he begin?

He'd phoned Dr Haydock in advance and got some directions, of course, so he was quite sure he wouldn't get lost. Not very much anyway. Still, he wasn't looking forward to limping around an unknown place, asking complete strangers for further directions, drawing attention he really didn't want...

"Dr Watson? Dr John Watson?" a voice asked from behind him.

He turned around and saw a discretely greying, middle-aged man in an old-fashioned chauffeur's uniform, including a matching cap.

"My name's Roberts; I'm from _Inch's Taxi Service_," the man explained. "Dr Haydock asked me to pick you up. He thought it would be more comfortable for you than walking all the way."

The _all the way_ phrase worried John for a moment about the possible fare – he was low on founds once again – but his concern proved unnecessary. The cab rolled slowly along what appeared to be the only actual street of the village, and the chauffeur – because calling Mr Roberts simply a _driver_ or a _cabbie_ would have been blasphemous – apparently considered it his duty to explain his passenger the sights of St Mary Mead… which, frankly, didn't seem too numerous.

"This is High Street; the only road of significance running through our village," he explained. "There's Mr Pretherick's office, should you need the solicitors; the butcher's, the new supermarket, the _Blue Boar Pub_ and a few other shops that are more interesting for the ladies."

John nodded, thankfully but with little real interest. He'd have time enough to discover all the useful places in that street, should he actually choose to settle here.

"I saw a fine Victorian mansion a little further up from the railway station," he said. "What was that?"

The chauffeur knew at once what he meant, of course.

"Oh, that's Gossington Hall," he replied. "It used to be the home of Colonel Arthur Bantry – a rather pompous old gentleman, according to my predecessor, Mr Inch – and his wife, Mrs Dolly Bantry. When the colonel died of pneumonia, quite a few years ago, Mrs Bantry sold the estate but continues to live on there in the grounds, in the East Lodge… which is more than enough for an old lady who lives alone, I say; and a very nice place it is, too."

"What happened to the Hall?" John asked, more out of politeness than out of true curiosity.

"Well, it changed ownership once or twice," the chauffeur said with a shrug. "Before it got purchased by Miss Marina Gregg."

"The film star who died a few years ago?" John could still vaguely remember the great brouhaha centred on the 'tragic death of the once-famous diva on her country estate', as the press had put it. He'd been on home leave at the time and Harry, a great fan of Miss Gregg, was quite inconsolable. "It happened _here_?"

"Oh, yes," Mr Roberts said with deep satisfaction. "Gossington Hall has seen its fair share of murder and mystery, as I'm sure you'll get to hear about in great detail, Doctor. The people of St Mary Mead claim a certain ownership of all that excitement and glamour. After all, little else ever happens here."

John froze for a moment. That last statement had a disturbing similarity to what he'd said to Ella right before meeting Sherlock for the first time.

_Nothing happens to me._

He'd come to realise what a dangerous statement that could be. There had been certainly more _happening_ to him in the last three years than he'd bargained for. What was that old saying? Be careful what you wish for – you might get it? Yes, something like that. And he, John Watson, was the living proof for the truth of that warning.

"Who owns the Hall now?" he asked, more to distract himself from his own memories than for any other reason.

"Miss Gregg's husband gave it back to Mrs Bantry for free, can you imagine it?" the chauffeur shook his head in disbelief. "He didn't even give an explanation; just had the document made up and off he was, with his whole staff. Poor Mrs Bantry didn't have an idea what to do with the Hall; still doesn't have one, in fact. It's way too large for her alone, and her children don't want it. But since Miss Gregg had it modernised on the inside while keeping its general looks untouched, perhaps Mrs Bantry can find an investor who will turn it into a hotel or something. It does have its charm."

John didn't feel entitled to be the judge of that, as he hadn't seen the Hall for longer than a fleeting moment, so he wisely remained silent. In the meantime they reached the end of the short row of local shops, and he got a glimpse of an old, beautiful little church further away.

"The parish church, St Andrew's," the chauffeur commented proudly. "It's partly Anglo-Saxon, they say. The setting for the only wall-paintings to survive in their original place from the twelfth century. You should hear the Vicar rhapsodise about it; actually, you probably will. Mr Clement is a decent chap but always happy to show off our church to new people. And he knows what he's talking about, too. He's a very scholarly fellow… if a tad long-winded, if you catch my drift."

John translated the hidden meaning of the Vicar's pontificating being a little boring and suppressed a smile.

The cab then turned to the right into Vicarage Road, between the butcher's shop and a pretty little Georgian house that seemed to have stood empty for some time, pulled up in front of a fairly large cottage, surrounded by a somewhat unkempt garden and overshadowed by a shabby Victorian monstrosity that could only be the Vicarage.

"Here we are, Dr Watson," the chauffeur said, a little unnecessarily, while holding open the cab door for John with old-fashioned courtesy. John thanked him, paid his fare and limped up the narrow path leading up to the house to ring the bell.

A muffled voice from within asked him to wait for a moment, and while he was waiting, he spotted a fragile, bird-like old lady with snow white hair (which she wore in a simple twist, pinned to the back of her head) and remarkably erect carriage working in her garden. At least she made half-hearted attempts to pull out some weeds, while her eyes, intelligent, observant and bright with curiosity, were fixed on John.

A little further down the lane separating the two houses, another old lady was sitting in a wheelchair, with an anaemic, frighteningly thin woman with a ghostly pale face buzzing around her like an excited bee. A live-in nurse perhaps, judging by her economic, practical movements; or some devoted relative with plenty of practice.

"Sizing up my clientele already, Dr Watson?" an amused voice said behind him and, turning around, John found himself face to face with Dr Gerard Haydock.

* * *

For some reason he'd half-expected to find some large, beefy, red-faced country doctor here. One who'd grown fat and content in his comfortable environment and had little interest in anything else. Somebody a bit like Mike Stamford, only twice as old.

The man, however, who shook his hand enthusiastically and ushered him into the house, couldn't possibly be more different from Mike if he tried.

To begin with, he wasn't particularly tall. He couldn't have more than a couple of inches on John; and like John, he possessed ample wiry strength, despite his age. An age that didn't seem to have lessened his mobility, which would have put a man of half his years to shame. He had a broad, friendly, barely lined face, crowned by a full head of short, curly white hair. His eyes were hazel and alive with curiosity and amusement.

One couldn't doubt for a moment that Dr Haydock still enjoyed life very much.

"I hope you don't mind if we go directly to the dining-room," he said apologetically. "It's almost lunchtime, and my housekeeper always gets cranky if I let the food go cold. In these days, when only the obscenely rich can afford live-in personnel, one has to keep such skilled helpers happy. I ordered lunch for two, if that's all right with you."

John had nothing against a cooked meal for lunch – it was something he could rarely afford – and soon they were sitting down to a steaming plate of bacon, eggs, roasted tomatoes, baked beans, grilled sausages, toast and even more mouth-watering stuff that would otherwise be considered as every possible ingredient of a full English _breakfast_. Small home-made pastries and fresh fruit completed a perfectly balanced meal.

"I find that I no longer can start the day with a heavy breakfast," Dr Haydock explained, "So I only wat toast, butter and jam with my breakfast tea. Around noon, however, I usually get fairly peckish and need the calories to get through the rest of the day. And it's better than having a big dinner any time."

John agreed that it might be easier on the stomach that way. (_Digestion slows me down_, Sherlock's declaration echoed in his mind, causing his chest to tighten painfully), and the two doctors dug into their lunch with gusto under the watchful eye of Mrs Jones, Dr Haydock's housekeeper. She was an attractive though somewhat intimidating black woman in her sixties with the bearing of a strict school matron, so John refrained from asking if there would be any beer in the house.

He could always visit the local pub later, what was its name? The _Blue Boar_ the chauffeur called it.

"So, the two old ladies in the garden; are they both your patients?" he asked his fellow doctor instead.

Dr. Haydock nodded. "And they're likely to remain mine till the bitter end, too. Miss Wetherby – the one in the wheelchair, although she _can_ walk short distances with the help of a cane if she has to – already declared herself too old to get used to a new doctor, and I'm afraid her friends will follow suit."

"Kinda hard to get yourself a new partner if your patients won't accept anyone," John commented with slight disappointment.

What little he'd seen from the bucolic little village he already liked and was looking forward to doing some more in-depth exploring.

Dr Haydock waved off his concern. "Oh, don't worry about that. The old ladies are a diminishing species; the main part of the work takes place at the _Development_; that's how we call the new housing estate… well, not _that_ new anymore, seeing as it's been built half a century ago, just compared with the rest of the village. Lots of families live there, and in what was once the _Old Hall_, many of them have reached the second or third generation already, with small children – house calls can be exhausting there, and I don't really feel up to _that_ any longer."

"Which is why you need a partner," John said. It wasn't a question, not really.

"Which is why I need a partner," Dr Haydock agreed. "One who answers the house calls for me and takes over half of my consulting hours. I'm not a young man, Dr Watson, and I'd like to slow down a little; to have some time to visit my sons and grandchildren; to read undisturbed in the evening, or watch a film on the telly, or just sit around in the _Blue Boar_ and chat with what friends are still there – things I always wanted to do. I want to enjoy myself before I get too old and doddery to do so."

Looking at the tanned, animated, bright-eyed face of the old doctor, John somehow doubted that _that_ time would ever come – or, at least, any time soon.

"And you think I'd fit in?" he asked doubtfully.

Dr Haydock shrugged. "I've checked your credentials; you may be a little over-qualified for the job but Dr Stamford assures me that you're capable and versatile, and I know him well enough to trust his judgement."

"Mike's a decent chap," John smiled tiredly. "Although he can be a bit too energetic in his efforts to help people."

"He means well," Dr Haydock grinned. "And I for my part appreciate his efforts."

"So do I," John admitted. "I'm just not sure he's right in this particular case," he gave his own leg a disgusted look. "You know, my leg… I'm not sure I'll be up to running circles around the village; and cycling is out of question, too."

"Perhaps all you need is the right motivation," Dr Haydock suggested gently. "Your limp is psychosomatic, after all, isn't it?"

John stiffened in his chair and gave the other doctor a narrow-eyed glare. "How would you know that?"

"I've read that… what's it called again?... that _blog_ of yours," Dr Haydock confessed; then, seeing John's thunderous expression, he raised a placating hand. "Please, calm down. Dr Stamford directed me to it, saying that I'd learn the most important things about you from it, without you having to talk about the painful events that made you want to leave London in the first place. I thought it was a practical solution."

John deflated, realising that Dr Haydock was right. The older doctor needed to know to whom he was offering a potential partnership, and it wasn't as if John would have been able to discuss either the war _or_ his time with Sherlock in the near future – if ever.

Besides, he'd put all that stuff up to the internet publicly, for anyone to read it, hadn't he? He couldn't really blame people for actually _doing_ so.

Still, knowing that his life had become an open book for Dr Haydock before they had even met was somewhat unsettling.

"I was hoping to escape all that stuff," he muttered. "That was the whole _point_ of moving out of London."

That, and the small matter that he couldn't afford 221B on his own and would rather die before accepting any help from Mycroft-bloody-Holmes. But he wasn't about to discuss the finer points of his decision with a man he'd just met.

Not even though he was seriously considering entering a partnership with said man.

"You can still do so," Dr Haydock said. "I haven't told a soul about these things; nor have I mentioned the existence of your blog. All my patients know is that you've been suggested by Dr Stamford – which would work to your advantage. People really liked Dr Stamford."

John could easily imagine _that_. Mike Stamford was eminently likeable. Like some oversized, clean-scrubbed toddler of rosy health and an amiable disposition. Especially old ladies liked that sort of doctor and trusted them almost instinctively.

Which meant, of course, that John would have to work hard to get accepted. He definitely wasn't the same type.

"Of course," Dr Haydock added, grinning, "you'll be the centre of village gossip for the next couple of months anyway. Within days, the whole St. Mary Mead will know where exactly you keep your toothbrush and what kind of product you put in your hair. And if, what God forbid, you change your aftershave, it will be a topic of conversation for weeks to come."

"Good Lord!" John laughed incredulously. "People really care for such things? Afternoon tea gatherings must be a riot here."

"Oh, yes," Dr Haydock answered with an emphatic nod. "You must understand them, though; nothing exciting ever happens here… save for the occasional murder in the most unexpected places, but that sort of thing is exceptionally rare. People need a hobby in a small village like ours."

Again, his own statement from three years previously echoed in John's mind: _Nothing happens to me_.

A most dangerous statement indeed, he reminded himself once again. One should be very careful what one wishes for – one might get it.

"Didn't they have the telly here?" he groused. "That would provide them with enough scandal, I'd think."

"Oh, but that's not half as interesting as what happens right in front of one's doorstep," Dr Haydock smiled faintly. "Who cares about a film star having a love affair with a young male model thirty years her junior when one can discuss the fact that the shop girl from the draper's has been seen in Much Benham with the fishmonger's assistant, although that young man is engaged to Janet, the girl working for Mrs Jamieson, the hairdresser's…"

John shuddered. "It sounds worse than the tabloids!"

"Oh no, not really," Dr Haydock reassured him. "They're not really malevolent, you know… just very, very curious. Our Vicar, Mr Clement, likes to say that the old ladies of St Mary Mead probably eat their meals standing up by the windows to be sure of not missing anything that happens in their neighbourhood."

All of a sudden, John had one of those _déjá vu_ moments again. Moments when he would relive short scenes in Sherlock's company with almost painful clarity. He could see before his mind's eye the two of them, sitting in _Angelo's_, watching for a sign for the serial killer in the pink lady's case, and heard the deep, beautiful voice of Sherlock saying:

_Lauriston Gardens, did you see it? Twitching curtains, little old ladies… Little old ladies, they're my favourite. Better than any security cameras._

"You mean like the two I passed on my way here?" he asked. "But surely, they cannot be _that_ observant! One of them is at least a hundred, the other one sitting in a wheelchair!"

Dr Haydock gave him a pitying look.

"My dear colleague, you should never underestimate the detective instinct of village life," he said. "If you do indeed choose to settle here, be prepared that everyone in St Mary Mead will know your most intimate affairs. There's no detective in England equal to a single lady of uncertain age with plenty of time on her hands."

"That," John declared, "is positively frightening."

He began to question the soundness of the mere idea of moving into such a place. Living with Mycroft's constant surveillance had been bad enough. The press beleaguering 221B during and after the Moriarty scandal had been worse. Much worse. He wasn't sure he could live under such circumstances again. All he wanted – all he _needed_ – was some peace and quiet, and yet not even such a sleepy little village seemed to offer exactly that.

Perhaps going abroad would be a better solution. Working for the _Médicines Sans Frontiers_ or something like that. Preferably in some bush hospital with no phone access.

As if reading his thoughts, Dr Haydock smiled again.

"There's no need to worry," he said. "They aren't really interested in your _past_. They'd be curious about what you're doing _now_, on a daily basis: the toothpaste you prefer; how you take your coffee; if you own a decent tea set… that sort of thing. The older generation is quite unique in this matter. And once they've accepted you, they'll be loyal to a fault. That's how they were raised and that's what they stick to. It's a second nature to them."

"Are you sure they _will_ accept me?" John asked. "I'm not Mike Stamford to charm them out of their reserve in no time."

"Oh, I think you'll do just fine," Dr Haydock grinned. "You have this open, honest, down-to-Earth air about you; they'll _love_ it. The fact that you were a soldier will help, too. Our ladies are old-fashioned enough to be drawn to retired officers."

That outrageous statement made John laugh. "Oh, c'me on, I really don't look suitably heroic for that!"

"Never say nay," Dr Haydock deadpanned; then he turned serious for real. "Well, what do you think, Watson? Could this be the place for you?"

"Perhaps," John conceded reluctantly. "For a while anyway. I'm not used to village life, to tell the truth. Have been a city boy all my life. But I might give it a try."

"Then consider this," Dr Haydock said. "Neither of my sons chose to follow me into medicine. Once I'm gone (and let's face it, it's only a matter of time, I'm beyond eighty already), _somebody_ will have to take over for me. I'd let go easier if I knew that somebody; if I'd introduced them to the practice and the patients myself."

That made sense from the old doctor's point of view, of course, but John had a hard time to imagine himself as a country doctor for life. He'd die from sheer boredom after a few years. Still, for the time being it seemed a good place for lying low and licking his wounds.

Perhaps he could even talk Harry into spending some time here. Try to get her away from the bottle after her recent relapse again. Much less temptation here. Not permanently, of course – they'd kill each other if forced to live under the same roof for too long – but from time to time it couldn't hurt. Not _much_.

"I can try," he finally said. "But I cannot promise that it would work."

Dr Haydock nodded in understanding.

"None of us ever can. I'm relieved all the same, even if it turns out as a temporary arrangement only," he paused; then he added eagerly. "When, do you think, could you start?"

John shrugged. "Any time you want. I'm between jobs right now, and the sooner I can get out of London the better for me. However, there are a few things I need to take care of first. And, of course, I'll need a place to live here. Mike said something about empty houses I could perhaps rent…"

"I can help you with that," Dr Haydock reached for his phone and scrolled down the saved numbers until he found the right one. His call was picked up almost immediately.

"This is Dr Haydock. Is Mr Pretherick available this afternoon? Yes, it's about those cottages up for renting. Three p.m, you say? Excellent. Yes, I'll come over with him. If you could prepare the documents in advance… Yes, thank you."

He hung up and smiled at John contentedly.

"That was Miss Costello, Mr Pretherick junior's secretary," he said. "A very competent young woman. Has a good head on her shoulders and skilled with those fancy computers. Quite pretty, too, if you're into the exotic, oriental type. Her grandparents on her mother's side came from India, and her father was Italian, I think."

John laughed. "For God's sake, Haydock, I'm looking for a house, not for a date!"

"Not yet perhaps," the older doctor winked at him. "But it never hurts to know who's available. Now, they're expecting us at the solicitor's office within the hour. Should we give that leg of yours some exercise?"

* * *

John had nothing against a little walk as long as they took it easy. He said so, and the two of them left Dr Haydock's house, being watched by the old ladies from the other side of the lane with unabashed curiosity.

"I think you're wrong about them eating at the window," John commented. "They must be eating in their gardens; or living off thin air. I doubt either of them has left her surveillance post for a moment since I arrived."

"You're probably right," Dr Haydock agreed, nodding jovially to the fluffy, white-haired old lady wrestling with the dandelions in the nearest garden. "Good afternoon, Miss Marple. Have I not told you to leave the weeding to your gardener? You're not supposed to do such hard work, you know!"

"Oh, I'm not doing all that much," the old lady replied in obvious frustration. "And it shows, too. That horrible old Leycock never does things the way I ask him to do." She turned her bright, intelligent eyes to John. "You should have seen my garden while I still had the strength to do all the work myself, Dr Watson. It was a thing of beauty… not such a dreary patch as it is now."

John gave the small garden with its myriad flowers a second look and found it hard to imagine that it had been even more beautiful, no matter how long ago. He voiced his opinion, and Miss Marple actually blushed like a schoolgirl who'd been given an unexpected component.

"That's very kind of you, Dr Watson, but compared with what it once looked like, it's really disappointing these days."

"I see you've already done some snooping around, Miss Marple," Dr Haydock commented good-naturedly before John could have started wondering how on Earth the old lady had learned his name.

"Oh, no, Dr Haydock, I really didn't have to _do_ anything," Miss Marple protested. "Cherry, that's my housekeeper," she added for John, "just came back from the post office where she happened to run into Mr Roberts from the cab service, you know…"

"… and since she also met Miss Wetherby's nurse, the entire village knows by now that Dr Watson arrived," Dr Haydock finished for her.

Miss Marple looked at him in a gentle, appealing manner.

"We're all so very glad that you've finally got some help, Dr Haydock," she said. "You're going to Mr Pretherick's now to see what accommodations are available, I presume?"

Dr Haydock shook his head in tolerant amusement. "Nothing gets past you, Miss Marple, is that right?"

"Not much," the old lady confessed with an almost embarrassed little smile; which she then turned on John. "Welcome to St Mary Mead, Dr Watson. I hope you'll like it here."

"A very nice little lady," John commented when they got out of Miss Marple's earshot – hopefully! – and walked leisurely up the Old Pasture Lane towards High Street.

Dr Haydock nodded.

"That she is. Very kind, very proper, always well-mannered – the textbook old lady, in fact. Unlike Miss Wetherby, God bless her, who's made of vinegar and gush," he paused before adding soberly. "Of course, Miss Marple is the much more dangerous of the two of them."

"That's hard to imagine," John said. Despite the total lack of physical resemblance, Miss Marple did remind him of Mrs Hudson a bit. Of course, Mrs Hudson wasn't quite the silly old lady she liked to play, either.

"Oh, but she is," Dr Haydock replied with feeling. "Miss Marple _always_ sees _everything_. Gardening is her perfect smoke screen, even though she can't really do much of it herself; and her hobby of observing birds through powerful glasses comes in handy when she wants to gather information."

"Still, she can't be everywhere at the same time," John pointed out.

"No, but as you've just heard, she's got the perfect information network," Dr Haydock said. "They watch and listen for her where she cannot be present in person. A good thing that she's so charming, or she'd scare me out of my wits – even though I've known her for decades," he added, laughing, as they turned to the left at the butcher's shop and onto High Street.

* * *

St Mary Mead had a rather charming High Street, John decided, eyeing the dignified old houses that were set flat back, with their ground floor windows displaying buns or vegetables or fruit. As they slowly walked up to the solicitor's office, he spotted a long, straggling draper's shop called _Langdon's_, according to the sign above the entrance; one that obviously sold all sorts of wool for knitting and crocheting and belonged to a Mrs Wisley, whoever she might be; an old-fashioned chemist's shop with wooden cabinets that had to be at least two hundred years old and from afar – opposite the pretentious post office – the simple yet beautiful little church again.

The glittering new supermarket with its sliding doors at the other end of the street was quite the contrast, though.

Dr Haydock followed his glance and smiled.

"Not even St Mary Mead can remain unchanged forever, although we do our best," he said. "When some of the shops changed hands here, modernisation was immediate… and sometimes a little intemperate, I'm afraid. Our old ladies never truly forgave the fishmonger for the new, larger shop window with all the frozen fish glaring back at them from within; and you should hear them complain about the supermarket. Actually, you probably will, as soon as you run into Miss Hartnell for the first time. She's very good at pouncing upon people in a heavy and cumbrous way; and she _loves_ to complain just about everything. Well, here we are."

The office of the solicitors _Pretherick & Son_ stood opposite the chemist's shop, situated in a well tended-to, two-storey house. Apparently, the ground floor housed the office itself, while the family lived upstairs, their rooms accessible both through the office staircase or directly through a side entrance.

The outer office was the very image of business-like efficiency. Right next to the entrance stood the desk of the trainee lawyer, equipped with an old-fashioned computer desktop, while the computer itself was presumably hidden under the desk. Behind it sat a young, blond man in his mid-twenties, immaculately clad in a three-piece black suit with a pale blue shirt and a chequered red tie.

The suit, though fitted, was clearly a Marks & Spencer model, and one on the cheaper side, too. Two years of association with Sherlock and Mycroft, both peacocks in their own respective manner, had schooled John's eye for quality clothing – or the lack thereof.

Nonetheless, even if the young man didn't have the money for expensive suits, he looked neat and tidy in his modest way; even had a gold tiepin fixing his tie (or rather gilded silver, considering his possible financial state), and while his shirt wasn't custom-made, it was crisply fresh, even in the afternoon, with every single hair on his handsome head in perfect order.

He greeted Dr Haydock with the easy familiarity of a long acquaintance and the doctor answered in kind, making the necessary introductions.

"Dr Watson – Idris Hopper, Mr Pretherick's trainee lawyer. Idris, this is Dr John Watson. He'll work with me in the practice for a while; hopefully for a _long_ while."

Idris Hopper shook hands with John politely – he had surprisingly soft hands but a firm grip – and gave him a look of more than just professional interest, seizing him up from head to toe. John backed off a step instinctively. This wasn't the first time that gay men had made a pass at him – apparently, being small and compact was appealing to some of them – but it had never been done so blatantly.

"Idris, subtlety!" the woman behind the desk next to the door leading to Mr Pretherick's inner office said warningly, and the young man shrank into himself immediately with an ashamed expression on his face. He couldn't have been _out_ for long.

Johns took a look at his rescuer. She, too, was fairly young, presumably in her early thirties, willowy with olive skin and an unruly mass of dark brown curls that she wore in a haphazard French twist on the nape of her long neck. Her thin, almost angular face was fine-boned yet strong-featured – too sharp and bitter to be conventionally pretty yet of some underlying, almost tragic beauty. It was dominated by a pair of large, almond-shaped brown eyes.

There could be no doubt that this was Miss Costello of whom Dr Haydock had spoken in such high tones.

She, like Idris, was immaculately clad, in a charcoal-grey costume with a comfortable full skirt and a cream-coloured blouse that looked like silk but probably wasn't. A pair of those gold-rimmed half-glasses, suited for reading or writing only, that had come into fashion a few years previously, was perched on the end of her slightly long nose as she was typing away on her keyboard with impressive speed and panache, without even looking at the computer screen.

She glanced at Dr Haydock over the rim of her glasses and stooped for a moment to announce their arrival on the office phone.

"Mr Pretherick will be free for you in a moment, Doctor," she then said before resuming her typing. "He's with another client right now. Please have a seat in the meantime. Can I bring you a coffee? Or a drink of water perhaps?"

"Thank you, Suzie, but we're fine for the moment," Dr Haydock replied with the same easy familiarity he'd spoken to young Idris Hopper with.

_He probably delivered them both, considering how long he's lived here_, John thought with mild amusement, choosing a comfortable-looking chair and bracing himself for a long wait.

* * *

Fortunately, the waiting proved much shorter than expected. About ten minutes (or even less) later the door to the inner office swung open and out strolled a man in a long grey coat, which John recognised as a World War II Royal Air Force greatcoat. With a captain's strips on the sleeve, no less!

On anyone else, such a pretentious piece of period clothing would have looked ridiculous. This man, though, had the height and the breadth to wear it; and to wear it well. He was six foot two at the very least, broad-shouldered, wide-chested and with boyish good looks, although he was about John's own age.

An age that would clash horribly with his spiky hair on anyone else. On him, it looked attractive. He had very bright, intensely blue eyes, a cleft chin and a wide, blinding smile that revealed twice as many perfectly even white teeth than any man should have legally owned.

Like young Idris before, he seized up John with one brilliant blue glance. This time, however, John felt flattered rather than uncomfortable, for in his interest was nothing calculating.

He was simply interested. Period.

"Why hello," he said with a wide smile and an accent that was a curious mix of American and Scottish. "I don't think we've met before; I'm sure I'd remember," he stretched out a big hand in John's direction. "Captain Jack Harkness, formerly US Air Force, nowadays with _Torchwood Airlines_."

"Captain John Watson, formerly with the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers," John replied with a wicked grin, shaking the proffered hand and enjoying the pilot's surprise. He loved confronting people, who often underestimated him because of his short stature, with his military past.

He could almost hear young Idris Hopper deflate behind his back like a punctured balloon. The boy clearly didn't feel up to the challenge of dating an ex-soldier. Thanks God for small blessings. John, for his part, was sick and tired of explaining people that he wasn't actually gay.

Captain Harkness, on the other hand, seemed delighted to find a fellow soldier willing to move to St Mary Mead. He extracted the promise from John that they'd meet at the _Blue Boar_ for a pint or two eventually – and then left in high spirits.

"Captain Harkness came to live in St Mary Mead just six months ago," Dr Haydock explained while Miss Costello showed them into Mr Pretherick's inner office. "He's not often here, though, as he flies long-distance routes – to Southern Asia, mostly – and hasn't found many friends yet. There haven't been men like him living here so far."

John could certainly understand such a rootless existence. Captain Harkness had, for all his cheerful, flirtatious manners, that hidden steel in his eyes only that men who'd seen real battle possessed. Getting used to civilian life again, even if he'd been lucky enough to keep his job as a pilot, couldn't have been easy.

Perhaps socialising with a fellow ex-soldier wouldn't so bad, after all. There were things no civilian could really understand; and besides, they didn't need to become bosom buddies. A pint or two and someone to talk to would suffice.

The inner office of Mr Pretherick had the agreeable mustiness of a long-established legal firm. Vast numbers of deed boxes labelled "Lady Edith Sheldon-West", "Col. Aug. Abbington", Mrs Estelle Protheroe, Deceased", etc., gave the required atmosphere of decorous country families and a legitimate, long-established business, although the more recent data was doubtlessly being stored digitally like everywhere else.

John had the odd feeling as if he'd stepped onto the set of a film taking place between the two world wars.

Mr Pretherick junior matched his environment perfectly. He was a man of middle height and middle age, with thinning straw blond hair and dull grey eyes; the very image of calm responsibility in his pin-striped three-piece suit that was of much better quality than the one worn by his young trainee lawyer. Not exactly Saville Row, but not mass produced, either, and the gold chain threaded through the buttonhole of his waistcoat belonged to a vintage pocket watch by the look of it; most likely inherited from his father or grandfather.

He was entirely unremarkable, the sort of man who'd never give a wife – _if_ he had a wife at all; he wasn't wearing a wedding ring – a moment of anxiety. He had a long neck with a pronounced Adam's apple, a colourless, somewhat cadaverous face and a long, thin nose. Nonetheless, there was sharp intelligence behind those seemingly dull eyes, and he spoke clearly and slowly, with much common sense and shrewd acumen.

He'd also clearly found the time to prepare himself for their visit because several manila folders containing the documents of available cottages in St Mary Mead were already lying on his desk.

_Several_ – which meant actually two.

"I understand that you're only planning to rent something for the time being, Dr Watson," he said, "and as you currently have no other income than your Army pension, I selected the only properties you'd be able to afford under the circumstances. You can always find something else once you've established yourself as Dr Haydock's partner."

John shot him a suspicious look. "What would you know about my financial status?"

"We've checked your background on Dr Haydock's request, of course, when you were suggested to him," the lawyer said with a thin smile that reminded John eerily of Mycroft. "Please don't be offended, Dr Watson. This is standard procedure when a partnership is considered – and quite legal, I assure you."

John nodded, inwardly cursing his knee-jerk reaction to any potential assault on his privacy. He _knew_ this was standard procedure; he'd just become deeply suspicious towards any intrusion into his affairs, legal or otherwise. He supposed that this, too, was Mycroft's fault; and of those bloody surveillance cameras of his.

"I understand," he said. "So, what have you got for me?"

"Two rather similar cottages, on the opposite sides of the meadow beyond the Vicarage," Mr Pretherick opened the folders and selected a few photos of each property. "Both are more than large enough for a man living alone and both are accessible directly from High Street."

He handed the photo of the charming little Georgian house John had passed with the taxi over to him.

"_Little Gates_, which is somewhat bigger and in a better shape, faces Dr Haydock's house from the other side than Old Pasture Lane, while the other one," he handed over another photo, "Mr Redding's Cottage, stands at the same height as the station, surrounded by a larger garden, facing away from High Street."

"What about the rent?" John asked, a little anxiously. At first sight both cottages would do, but it always came down to the money.

"You should be able to afford either place," the lawyer assured him. "The rent is fairly low for both, as the original owners died decades ago and the properties have been entrusted into the care of our firm. Both could do with some redecoration and a thorough paint job, but the plumbing is in a good shape and the heating works in both places. So if you're not bothered by outdated wallpapers and somewhat wacky furniture you can move in at once."

John thought at the fairly hideous wallpaper in the living room of 221B and suppressed a sigh. Given Mrs Hudson's alarming taste in flat decoration, especially her inordinate fondness for the colour purple – not to mention Sherlock's tendencies to shoot or spray-paint the walls and put up skulls or pictures of skulls everywhere – there was very little in the area that could really shock him. He said so.

"I'd like to take a look at the houses first, though, before I'd choose one," he then added.

"Of course, of course," Mr Pretherick agreed. "Miss Costello will give you the keys. You can simply bring them back when you're finished, any time during office hours."

John presumed that there wasn't much left worth stealing in either house if the lawyer would let him keep the keys overnight, but thanked Mr Pretherick nevertheless. Then they left with the promise to return a day or two later to finalise the deal.

For the first time in almost a year John was actually looking forward to the next day. A place to call home sounded nice.

~TBC~


	5. Chapter 5: Settling Down in St Mary Mead

**Precious Like Rubies**

**by Soledad**

**Note:** Some lines of description concerning St Mary Mead have been taken from the novel "The Murder at the Vicarage", with small alterations to adapt them to modern times.

Harry Watson is "played" by Emilia Fox.

Beta read by my good friend Linda Hoyland, whom I owe my never-ending gratitude.

* * *

**Chapter 05 – Settling Down in St Mary Mead**

John spent the night in Dr Haydock's rarely used guest room. Dr Haydock had insisted, and since there was no point in going back to London, only to return again in the next morning to check out the available cottages – and since St Mary Mead had nothing even remotely resembling a hotel – John gave in with very little argument.

The news that he was about to move in had apparently made its rounds the previous night because when he got up (rather late) the next morning, several people had already dropped by and left their cards. Mrs Clement, the vicar's wife. Miss Marple and Miss Wetherby from the immediate neighbourhood – well, in Miss Wetherby's case it had been her nurse, according to the doctor's housekeeper, but that was basically the same. Somebody called Mrs Price-Ridley. And a Miss Hartnell; most likely the same one that was good at pouncing upon people.

"I didn't know that people still _called_," John said in surprise, sitting down to a late breakfast in the doctor's kitchen. "And with _cards_, too. It feels like some period novel."

"You obviously know nothing about life in the country," Dr Haydock, who was taking a break between calls, came in to have tea with his guest, laughed. "People, especially old ladies, are very conservative here; and very conscious about proper manners."

Mrs Jones, the doctor's draconian housekeeper, must have been of the same stock, for – despite Dr Haydock's preference for having just toast and jam with his breakfast tea – there were home-made oatcakes for the guest, fresh and hot from the oven, with marmalade and whipped cream. They were excellent, too; the best oatcakes John had had since the death of his maternal grandmother.

He told so, and though Mrs Jones was too dark-skinned to actually _blush_, her jewelled eyes gleamed with satisfaction.

"Am I supposed to do anything about those cards?" John asked uncertainly, because Dr Haydock had been right: he didn't know a thing about country life.

"No; not yet, at least," Dr Haydock replied. "Those are simple welcome messages. Later, of course, when you've settled, you'll be invited to tea, treated to home -made cordials and interrogated within an inch of your life. But right now they'll give you time to find your place amongst us."

"Speaking of which," John said. "I ought to go and take a look at those cottages. Can you give me directions?"

"I can do better than that," Dr Haydock answered. "David Clement, the Vicar's son, offered to show you around. He's not working today and wants to be useful. He's a nice boy, you'll like him. Just don't let him start on about those wretched computers of his or he'll never shut up and you won't get to see anything."

* * *

David Clement, a handsome young man of twenty-something, with curly blond hair and a marked resemblance to Prince William (a _younger_ Prince William, from the time before he started losing his hair) arrived an hour later, brimming with curiosity and eager to go.

"No computer talk, David!" Dr Haydock warned him, after having introduced them to each other.

"Yes, Uncle Haddock, sir!" David replied sweetly and gave a mock salute.

Dr Haydock shook his head. "That stopped being funny when you turned seven, boy. Off with you, and don't bore Dr Watson to death!"

David laughed and ushered John out of the house, explaining that as a little boy he hadn't been able to pronounce Dr Haydock's name properly, hence the silly nickname. He, too, had been delivered by the old doctor, of course, like half the village.

"He's never really cross me about it, though," he added as they walked around the doctor's house to the beautiful little Georgian cottage, surrounded by a small garden, right at the corner of High Street – on the opposite one than the butcher's shop.

"This is _Little Gates_," he announced. "According to my father it once belonged to a Colonel Abbington. The old boy served somewhere in India or Pakistan or some other Eastern country; and at that time the house was full of brass tables and Burmese idols, which made Dad extremely uncomfortable, of course. He's a bit old-fashioned, even as vicars go. Shall we go in?"

John nodded and followed the vicar's son, who not only turned out to be excellent company, but seemed to know just about everything about the village. Not surprising, probably, as he was born and bred here.

_Little Gates_ was a small house of very nice proportions. It must have also gone through a phase of modernisation and redecoration, albeit quite some time ago. It was furnished very simply, with furniture that had counted as modern twenty or thirty years previously, but in exquisite taste. Even though clearly unused for decades and covered with dust blankets, there was a sense of harmony and rest about it.

"This seems like a woman's home," John murmured, and David Clement nodded in agreement.

"Yeah, the house was rented by a Mrs Lestrange – who actually turned out to be the first Mrs Protheroe – for a short time. Right before Colonel Protheroe got killed by in Dad's own study by his second wife and her secret lover. It was quite the scandal, I'm told – of course I wasn't even born then. 'The Murder at the Vicarage' the press called it."

He told all this with obvious delight. Understandable as he'd never had to deal with the ramifications, even if the crime had happened in his father's study. John now understood what Dr Haydock had meant with 'the occasional murder' – and wondered briefly if there had been more.

"What happened to this Mrs… Lestrade, you called her?" he then asked, wondering if the women could have been related to Greg in any way.

"_Lestrange_," David Clement corrected. "She was very ill by that time already; only came here to see her daughter who lived with Colonel Protheroe at Old Hall. They went abroad together after the death of the colonel and Lettice never returned. She sent some official declaration to _Petherick's_ that she didn't want anything from here, and that Old Hall should be sold, and that was basically it."

"These are Mrs Lestrade… I mean Mrs Lestrange's things then?" John asked. "What about original owner's stuff?"

"As far as I know it's been packed away and stored in the attic," the vicar's son replied with a shrug. "I could be mistaken, of course. Old Colonel Abbington is barely more than a name; no-one ever mentions him. I understand that he wasn't very popular."

He looked around. "Well, how do you like the place?"

"It's very nice," John allowed. "Very nice indeed. Just a little too close to High Street. The garden is barely enough to create _some_ distance. I'd prefer if people couldn't peer through my window all the time."

"This is St Mary Mead; wherever you choose to live, they'll do it," David Clement declared. "Let's take a look at the other one then. It has a much larger garden, but I warn you: the whole place is in a much worse shape."

* * *

The other house – called Mr Redding's Cottage by the locals, after his infamous last owner, who'd helped the second Miss Protheroe to murder her husband, apparently – could be seen just as one turned off the railway station, John realised. It stood in an isolated position with no other houses near it, opposite _Little Gates_ across The Fields, as the locals called the meadow beyond the Vicarage. The large garden, untended-to for decades, had gone rather wild, the overgrown bushes hanging over the fence as if they wanted to climb out from behind it.

"As I said: not in the best shape," David Clement unlocked the little rustic gate, from which a now overgrown and barely visible footpath led up to the front door.

"Dad says it wasn't the best-ordered place to begin with, though," he continued. "Mr Redding apparently lived in the midst of artistic chaos that would have driven _him_ mad in no time. Every shelf and table littered with the weirdest artefacts, I understand."

"Sounds like someone I used to know," John murmured, his heart contracting painfully at the memory of Sherlock's mess in the living room of 221B.

David Clement gave him a quick look but wisely didn't ask any questions. Instead, he took the key from John's unresisting fingers and inserted it in the lock.

"Of course, Mr Redding's personal belongings were confiscated or sold," he said, leading John into the small living room. "But the furniture came with the house, so it also remained here – what's left of it."

Said furniture, at least in the living room, consisted of a lot of empty shelves, a surprisingly nice chest of drawers, two small, low coffee tables, a fireplace, and a few stuffed armchairs in various stages of decomposition. The wallpaper was loose in places and faded beyond any recognisable colour, and the paint was peeling off the ceiling.

The tiny foyer, the bedroom, the guest room, the bathroom and the surprisingly spacious kitchen weren't in any better shape, either. The attic, accessible from the larder by a ladder, was cluttered with unidentifiable stuff of various former tenants, packed into large boxes.

Still, John felt a tug of fondness for the place that he hadn't felt in _Little Gates_.

"I think I'll take this one," he said.

David Clement frowned. "Are you sure? It will require a lot of work to make it really habitable; and it will swallow a good deal of money, too."

John realised that. And yet he'd chosen already.

"I know it will," he said. "But it…how should I put it so that it won't sound horribly sappy? It calls to me like the other one didn't. And perhaps I can get some help from my old Army mates with the redecorating."

"My friends and I did something similar when Ianto moved into that flat at _The Development_," David Clement said thoughtfully. "It was rather fun, actually. Perhaps they'll be willing to do so again. At least we're certainly closer than your friends."

"They'd do that for a complete stranger?" John asked in surprise.

David Clement shrugged. "Why not? There isn't much else to do in St Mary Mead; and you can only spend so much time at the _Blue Boar_… or in front of the telly."

* * *

With that promise in mind, John took the keys back to Mr Petherick's office and told the lawyer that he'd take Mr Redding's Cottage for the next six months. Miss Costello had already prepared the contract; all he had to do was to fill in the form, sign the document and instruct his bank to transfer the rent for the first two months.

For that, however, he had to return to London, for his bank was _not _represented in St Mary Mead, and he was wary of dealing with such things via the internet, even though David Clement _had_ offered his help. But he had to dissolve his so-called household in London anyway, so going back wasn't an extra effort.

All this took surprisingly little time, and while part of him was glad to leave London (and the painful memories) behind, the changes appeared awfully sudden after the long stagnation. Still, it was good to finally be able to _do_ something; to look forward to something; to take his life into his own hands again.

Then there was the small matter of telling Harry and his remaining friends, few though _those_ were, about his decision.

* * *

Harry took the news in her stride. They didn't see each other much anyway, and St Mary Mead was close enough to London for the occasional visit. She even offered to help John clean out the cottage – and since she would only start her new job in the following month, John accepted the offer, hoping that being busy would keep her away from the bottle until then. Seeing her relief when he accepted told him that she must have counted on the same.

Mrs Hudson promptly became teary eyed on hearing the news, of course. On the one hand, she was happy that John finally emerged from the deep, dark hole into which he'd fallen after Sherlock's death. On the other hand, it saddened her to lose him, though, even if only to a different job in a different place. She did promise, of course, to visit John regularly, as soon as the cottage was cleaned up enough to accept guests.

Mike Stamford, naturally, was enthusiastic; and so was his wife, for the chance to have her husband to herself alone in the future. She even offered to help John move (she had a car of her own), which John politely refused. His meagre belongings consisted of books, mostly, which were still waiting in cardboard boxes in Harry's attic, and wouldn't fit into Gwen's small car.

Fortunately, Bill Murray had some old Army buddy who promised to lend them his van – which was all John needed.

Lestrade called a few times. He'd long been reinstated in his job as Detective Inspector, since the internal investigation had proved all cases with Sherlock involvement clear. It hadn't cleared Sherlock's name in the so-called Richard Brook case, but relieved Lestrade from all the blame – the fact that the Chief Superintendent had been removed from his post and was facing an investigation of his own in the meantime might have helped – and Lestrade had tried to extend the olive branch repeatedly ever since.

As always, John answered his calls, listened to what he'd say – and then hung up on him. It wasn't that he blamed Lestrade for Sherlock's fate – the Detective Inspector had been under immense pressure from above with no-one to back him up – but he belonged exclusively to the time spent with Sherlock, and it was simply too painful to talk to him.

In another year, perhaps, John told himself. Or in ten, unless a miracle happened.

Mycroft Holmes also called several times. John didn't answer those calls.

Then he texted repeatedly. John deleted the messages unread.

Then he sent Anthea with a car, and that was the moment when John lost it. In his controlled, quiet and downright frightening way.

"Listen to me, Miss BlackBerry, cause I'm only gonna tell you this once," he said in a calm, even voice. "You tell your boss to keep his pointy nose out of my life – now and forever. The only common thing between us was Sherlock, and thanks to him that's gone now… with the single advantage that I don't have to endure the meddling of your boss any longer. I paid a high price for that freedom; it cost me my best friend. So tell him to keep out, or by God, if I see you or any of his other minions ever again, I'll put a bullet in your heads. I mean it."

Threatening to kill the personal assistant of the British Government on sight perhaps wasn't the wisest thing, but Mycroft apparently got the message at last. The phone calls and the text messages stopped, and if he was still watching John – which John supposed he was – it was done so discretely that one couldn't catch him red-handed.

Which was fine with John, as long as he didn't have to see any of them.

All in all, it took him less than a fortnight to get everything settled and ready to go. On his last evening in London, he had dinner with Sarah Sawyer at _Angelo's._ They remained friends after their ill-fated attempts to date (ill-fated mostly due to Sherlock's constant interference), and John wanted to say his farewells to Angelo, too.

The big, burly Italian became very emotional, on hearing that John was leaving London. He was probably missing Sherlock, too, and regretted losing the last connection to their late, mutual friend. He declared that dinner was on the house, and whenever John might come back to London for a visit, he could eat in his restaurant for free – a privilege that, until then, had been Sherlock's only. John was touched and promised Angelo to come to visit whenever he could.

He promised Sarah to keep in touch as well. That's what the internet was for, after all, and David Clement had promised to see that his connection _would_ work flawlessly. All in all, it was a pleasant evening, though emotionally draining.

Returning to his bleak little flat, he found a short, hand-written message from Mycroft, encouraging him to take whatever he wanted from Sherlock's belongings… which still were at 221B, partially boxed, otherwise just lying around in the living room and the bedroom.

At first, John wanted to refuse the offer. After some consideration, however, he decided to take the microscope, the laptop – and Billy, the skull. For different reasons.

A microscope – especially a Prior ZoomMaster 65 model, much liked by researchers for its versatility – could always prove handy for a doctor.

The laptop contained all Sherlock's case notes and his research; John didn't want it to fall into other hands. Especially not Mycroft's; it was a matter of protecting Sherlock's privacy, even though he was dead.

And the skull had been Sherlock's best friend before he had met John; leaving it behind to Mycroft's tender mercies would have been cruel, John decided. Besides, a skull on a doctor's desk – or the bookshelf probably would be more prudent – was a classic, wasn't it?

* * *

St Mary Mead, of course, was buzzing with excitement by the time Bill Murray steered his friend's van around the railway station and into the large, overgrown garden of Mr Redding's Cottage. As John would learn soon, him moving in had been _the_ topic of every conversation all week.

The people really had to have dull lives in this place, he decided.

He was surprised to see that David Clement and his friends had made considerable headway in his absence. The rotten pieces of furniture had been thrown out, the god-awful wallpaper removed in every room, and when John, Harry and Bill began to unload the boxes full of books (and very few household items), they found Captain Harkness in the living room, wearing a dirty blue coverall, standing on top of a double ladder and giving the ceiling a new paint job.

The old paint, that had been peeling off, had obviously been removed at some time previously.

"I wasn't sure what colour you'd prefer," the pilot grinned down from his vantage point of about two and a half metres above them. "But I hoped you wouldn't mind simple matt white. I had several pots left from the reconstruction of my own house and thought I'd put them to good use. They were only sitting in the cellar, gathering dust."

John was honestly touched. David Clement and his young friends helping a complete stranger was one thing. They saw it as a party; and perhaps David being a parson's son was more inclined to such small charitable deeds than the average Joe. But Captain Harkness certainly had better things to do than helping him redecorate the cottage.

He said so. But the pilot just laughed; again, showing more teeth than it was legally possible.

"Never mind, Captain," he replied. "I'm between two long flights and, frankly, bored out of my head. Besides, a little exercise will do me good. I was about to develop a real paunch."

John just shook his head, laughing. While Captain Harkness wasn't exactly whippet thin, he was far from getting fat, either. But if he wanted to make friends with a fellow ex-soldier and thought that painting the house was the way to do it, John wasn't eager to discourage him. With his own short stature – not to mention his bad shoulder – painting the ceiling would have been very complicated.

And Harry wouldn't climb onto a ladder unless it was absolutely necessary. Nor would John let her, no matter what. Being an alcoholic did bad things to one's balance.

After a bit of chaos at the beginning, soon everyone found his or her job, doing what would best suit them. John had purchased several rolls of fairly neutral eggshell-coloured wallpaper in a sale, back in London – a soft, creamy colour with a tiny, barely visible pattern of meandering branches and leaves – so David Clement and his friends attacked the bedroom and the guest room, where the paint job on the ceiling was already finished. John and Harry united their strength to clean out the kitchen and the bathroom, both of which had been painted a uniform, rather unflattering blue.

After accidentally bumping the kitchen wall, part of the blue paint peeled off and – to everyone's surprise – they discovered that both rooms had originally been tiled before the tiling had been painted over. Some vigorous scrubbing (which caused sheer agony in John's wounded shoulder afterwards) revealed that those weren't just any old tiles: they were delicate Delftware tiles and panels.

"Well, this is… unexpected," John commented, when they'd managed to scrub away the paint on a somewhat larger surface and the distinctive pictures of native Dutch scenes with windmills and fishing boats, hunting scenes, landscapes and seascapes became visible, with water-carrying men in their tall hats and wooden clogs and women in winged wimples and multiple petticoats under their ample skirts.

The individual tiles and panels seemed to form a larger pattern that probably stretched all over the kitchen and the bathroom but could not yet be seen. Captain Harkness came over from the living room and hummed in appreciation.

"Very pretty," he said. "These must be at least three hundred years old; I saw tiled kitchens like this in the Netherlands and Germany. I bet the rent would be much higher, had Mr Petherick ever taken a closer look at the details."

"The cottage itself has been built in the late 18th century," David Clement said. "It has been redecorated several times since then, though. Mum says that the ugly blue paint was already in place when Mr Redding lived here. He probably didn't have a clue what was hidden beneath it; although, as an artist, he might have valued it."

"It feels like moving into a museum…" Harry commented, dragging a finger along the delicate blue lines. "Your gut feeling was apparently right again, Johnny."

Despite the throbbing in his wounded shoulder – which, he knew, would only get worse on the next day – John was absurdly pleased with his lucky choice. Almost a modest man of simple tastes and limited needs, he did appreciate beauty; especially that in practical, everyday things.

He remembered what poor Soo Lin had said: that the old Chinese teapots weren't meant to stand in a museum, behind glass – they needed to be used for their real purpose. A Delftware-tiled kitchen fell into the same category, in his opinion.

Unfortunately, they only managed to clean a relatively small patch of the tiled wall in both rooms; and John knew he wouldn't be able to do much on the following days. He had already overextended his bad shoulder; and he was going to pay for it, big time.

"We won't manage this alone," he said glumly. "This is an awful lot of work, and I won't be able to help with it for a while. We need help. Professional help, if possible."

"Perhaps I can be of assistance with that," a gentle voice said behind them and, turning around, they spotted Miss Marple, standing at the gate.

* * *

She looked the epitome of a middle class lady of good breeding in her neat little grey costume, with a small hat of the same colour perched right above her French knot. She was carrying a sizeable handbag with her and even wearing gloves. Though her stiff legs and somewhat swollen ankles revealed the frailty of her age, she seemed full of good-natured excitement, her intelligent, bird-like eyes sparkling.

"I'm sorry to drop by uninvited, Dr Watson," she continued, _not_ looking sorry the least, reminding John of Dr Haydock's remark that she was probably the most dangerous old lady in the village. "It wasn't my intention, I assure you. I was visiting my friend, Miss Hubbard, you see; she lives right next to the railway station, and as Inch was late, which almost _never_ happens, I thought I might walk part of the way and probably meet him. And though I wasn't eavesdropping, of course, I couldn't help to hear what you were talking about, with the windows wide open and Captain Harkness having such a clear, ringing voice…"

She apologised repeatedly and profoundly, getting more entangled in her explanations by the moment – probably intentionally. John laughed.

"It's all right, Miss Marple, we weren't discussing any deep dark secrets. You said you could find us some help with the house cleaning?"

Miss Marple nodded eagerly. "I do believe so, yes. You see, the daughter of Mrs Tyler, the cook of the _Blue Boar_ – and an excellent cook she is, or so my nephew tells me, which is probably the reason why Mr Williams keeps her, despite her somewhat… difficult nature – well, her daughter does house cleaning on occasion. She used to work in a shop in Much Benham before running away with a gentleman old enough to be her father… but that's neither here nor there, I'm afraid. In any case, she's been without a job ever since her return almost two years ago. Cherry, my housekeeper, knows her and can see if she's available in the next few days if you'd like."

John hesitated for a moment, wondering how much he hired help would cost him and whether he could actually afford it, after the other expenses, but finally gave in. He had already ruined his shoulder for the next week, at the very least – which had been stupid, but he had so enjoyed working on the first real home solely his since… well, since forever – and he couldn't expect Harry to do all the dirty work.

For starters, it would have been too much; and besides, she was his sister and not, as Miss Marple called it in her wonderful, old-fashioned manner, his parlour maid.

* * *

And so on the next day Miss Rose Tyler appeared at Mr Redding's Cottage, offering her help with the removing of the blue paint from the Delftware tiles and with the general cleaning – for a fairly reasonable price.

She was a young girl of twenty or twenty-one, with her original dark hair coloured blond (and a shabby job it was!), with big, blue eyes and, frankly, an appallingly low intelligence level. Sherlock would have chased her away after about twenty seconds, stating that such a low IQ insulted his sense of order. John, wisely, realised how little actual intelligence was needed for scrubbing off old paint from even older ties and decided to be patient.

Rose also needed constant supervision to do a thorough job, or else she'd have spent most of the time texting her boyfriend – apparently a car mechanic working in a garage somewhere in _The Development_ – but Harry volunteered for that, while arranging what little of household items John owned in the old-fashioned kitchen cupboard. That was one piece of furniture that had survived in a surprisingly good shape.

"You'll need some pots and saucepans, Johnny," she declared. "I know you're not planning to actually _cook_ here, but you'll need something to heat up leftovers, at least. Something microwave-compatible would be practical."

"I don't even _own_ a microwave," John reminded him.

It was true. The one with the exploding eyeballs and other unsavoury stuff back on 221B had belonged to Sherlock and was already beyond help anyway.

"Yes, you do," Harry replied. "I bought a new one last month, but the old one is still working. You can have it until you can afford something better. So go and buy some pots and pans."

"_Halletts_ on the far end of High Street would be the right place for that," David Clement supplied, brushing down the wallpaper in the living room energetically to smooth out any potential air bubbles caught beneath it. "And, according to Mum, you'd need to go to _Langdon's_ if you wanted some decent curtains… who the hell needs curtains anyway? Venetian blinds are much cooler and more practical."

"They are also much more expensive," John returned. "Besides, I _like_ curtains. They're classy."

There _had_ been curtains at 221B, although they were hardly ever closed. Their main purpose seemed to be to provide a matching frame to Sherlock's silhouette when he stood at the window and played the violin.

Perhaps getting curtains wasn't such a good idea after all.

But Harry found curtains classy, too, and she ran off at once to purchase some. John sighed, thinking of the steadily deepening dent in his bank account, but didn't stop her. It was so seldom that he'd see her so energetic and excited; he wanted to enjoy the rare sight while it lasted.

Besides, he _needed_ curtains to protect his privacy in a village where gossip seemed to be the favourite pastime of all inhabitants. And they were still a great deal cheaper than Venetian blinds would be.

* * *

Harry needed more than two hours to get back, still full of energy – and yet empty-handed.

"Where are my curtains?" John asked, hesitating between relief and disappointment.

"Being cut to the right size and seamed professionally," Harry replied, landing heavily on the only more or less stable chair in the room like a sack of potatoes. "Goodness, but shopping comes close to hand-to-hand combat in this place. I ran into an old lady at _Langdon's_ – Mrs Dolly something, I didn't understand her name, she was practically shrieking all the time – and she had very firm opinions about what kind of curtains would match Mr Redding's Cottage."

David Clement laughed. "That would have been Mrs Bantry," he said. "The widow of _Colonel_ Bantry."

"The one who owns that pompous Victorian mansion off the road?" John asked.

"The one and only," David Clement agreed. "She is indeed very opinionated and thinks she knows everything about properly furnishing a house. If you're lucky, Doctor, you may be invited for tea one day. She lives in a rather… _floral_ environment."

John suppressed a shudder. Harry spotted his reaction and laughed.

"Be grateful Johnny; cause I fought like a lion for your right to have brown and ochre curtains, instead of some of the rather hideous colours and patterns Mrs Whatshername wanted to talk me into buying" she said. "What's it with old ladies and huge, hideous patterns anyway?"

"It must be an age thing," John agreed, remembering with a certain fondness of the eye-watering wallpaper in the living room of 221B. Mrs Hudson seemed to believe in pompous surroundings, too.

Of course, even a 'luxurious large scale flock design of a dark chocolate fleur de lys motif within a trellis pattern on a metallic background that varied in colour between aqua and cream, depending on position, lighting and eye line'(*) paled when compared with Sherlock's flamboyant personality.

"In any case," Harry continued, "I won the battle this time. And since no-one seems to like brown and ochre fabric in this village, I even got them for half the price, assuming that I'd buy the matching bed covers as well. Which I did. They promised to that everything will be ready and delivered in two days' time."

John wasn't really sure that he _wanted_ matching curtains and bedcovers – it seemed a somewhat… _girly_ idea – but since they were already ordered and since Harry got them for half the price, he wisely accepted his fate. There were worse things than a colour-coordinated environment, after all.

* * *

Naturally, the news of an unknown blonde woman purchasing curtains and bedcovers for the new doctor made its way round St Mary Mead in record time. More so as Mrs Dolly Bantry had been present at the event in question.

"She's not very young," the cheerful yet somewhat distracted widow of the late Colonel Bantry explained her lady friends at the usual Wednesday afternoon tea at the Vicarage. "I think she's about forty or so. All that long, unkempt blonde hair makes it complicated to try to guess somebody's true age. In my time, only young girls wore such wild hair… and she's definitely _not_ a young girl. She's greying; and she looks like she's had a hard life."

"Yes, those small wrinkles around the eyes and the mouth are telling, aren't they?" Griselda, who'd paid the one or other visit the 'construction site', as David and his friends had come to call the cottage they were helping to redecorate, commented. "And she has a very unhealthy colour, too."

_Which is always the case if someone is a habitual drinker_, Miss Marple thought sadly. Although she'd only seen the mysterious woman for a moment, who had appeared sober at the time. Still…

"Do you think she's the doctor's _wife_?" Miss Hartnell asked eagerly. "Or could she be his, what's it called nowadays, his _affair_?"

"She isn't young or pretty enough for _that_," Mrs Bantry declared in a tone that brooked no argument. "Men in Dr Watson's age don't have affairs with women like her. They cheat on their wives with young things that could be their daughters and are out to get their money. She _must_ be his wife."

The other… er… _mature_ ladies – most of them spinsters or widowed for decades – bowed to her expertise. After long years in fairly happy matrimony and half a dozen children, she ought to know such things.

"Actually, she's his sister," David Clement strolled into his mother's drawing room and stole a biscuit from the plate. "His _older_ sister. She's about to start a new job in a fortnight or so and is using her accumulated leave from the last one to help him in getting settled."

Disappointment spread among the worthy ladies of St Mary Mead like bushfire. A sister! And one that didn't even intend to stay with her brother! That was another potential source of information lost right at the beginning.

Miss Marple was the only one neither disappointed nor particularly surprised. She might not have got a good, hard look at Miss Watson, but the way she and Dr Watson interacted was not how husband and wife would behave. There was familiarity, yes, even a certain level of intimacy, but it came from a shared past, not from physical attention.

Of course, even _that_ could have been the result of a long marriage in which the fire had burned to ashes years ago. But the Watsons seemed to have the same relationship as Dr Griffith and his sister used to have… or indeed any other bachelor she'd known who had lived with their sisters.

Only that Dr Watson and his sister weren't planning to live together; probably never had. Could she be married, too? No; she wouldn't be able to dispose over her time so freely then. But perhaps she _had_ been married at some time, and after getting a divorce she'd become fond of her independence and didn't want to give it up again. The unmarried sister willing to run her brother's household had become a rare thing in recent times.

Or it could be the drinking, of course. As modern as it was for women to drink nowadays, perhaps Dr Watson disapproved of his sister's habit. Even though she appeared clean at the moment, Miss Watson had all the tell-tale signs of an alcoholic. Being unable to help must have been hard for her brother.

In any case, it seemed to be an interesting puzzle; one that could be unravelled over a nice cup of tea. People were always willing to tell fluffy old ladies things that they wouldn't tell anyone else. And the news that _Doctor_ Watson was very fond of tea had already made its rounds in St Mary Mead, thanks to Rose Tyler.

Mentally forming the words of a proper invitation – she'd compose a written one and send it over to the Watsons, of course – Miss Marple leaned back in her chair and turned her attention back to the rest of the local gossip. Being informed about everything that might be going on in St Mary Mead was _so_ important! One could never know when a piece of information would be needed.

~TBC~

(*) This is the official description of the living room wallpaper in 221B, quoted from the Sherlockology website.


End file.
